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THE WILL 
TO BE WELL 



BY 

CHARLES BRODIE PATTERSON 

Author of il The Measure of a Man" "Seeking the Kingdom, 
"Beyond the Clouds" "The Library of Health " "New 
Thought Essays," and "Dominion and Power," and 
Editor of MIND 



FIFTH EDITION 



ENLARGED AND REVISED 




FUNK <y WAGNALLS COMPANY 

NEW YORK AND LONDON 
I906 



LIBRARY of CONGRESS 
Two Copies Received 
JAN 25 i.q.M 

Co^yri^ht Entry 

■-1**90 * 

CLASS 4/ XXc. No, 

/* 7 ?^ 

COPY B. 






Copyright, 1901, by 

CHARGES BRODIE PATTERSON 

Entered at Stationers' Hall, London 

All rights reserved 



Copyright, 1906, by 
FUNK & WAGNAI,I,S COMPANY 

[Printed in the United States of A merica] 
Published January, 1906 



PREFACE 

The age of materialism is passing away; and 
the pessimism and infidelity of the past, with 
which it was so closely associated, no longer fill 
the minds of men with discord and unrest. As 
a transitory condition it was doubtless neces- 
sary, because the real side of life is made evident 
through contrast. Probably the world has 
never seen nor known an age that has been 
more densely materialistic than the one just 
passed; not that it was altogether physical in its 
nature, but the intellect of man was used to sub- 
vert and subordinate the spiritual sense to the 
intellectual reasoning and sense desires. 

On the physical side of life the world has been 
ransacked for every kind of mineral poison with 
the expectation that through their introduction 
into the physical organism health and strength 
would be the result. 

In man's intellectual and religious world the 
spirit has played no part. Dogmatic utterances, 
binding creeds, and the degradation of himself 
to a "worm of the dust" and a miserable sinner," 
have served to fill up the sum of his intellectual 
vagaries. 

But this is all passing away before the coming 
of a newer and higher conception of life; and 



this New Thought lays its foundation in an 
Omnipotent Life and a Universal Intelligence 
acting through universal law — law while exact- 
ing conformity to its requirements, shows itself 
to be beneficent in character. 

In the mind of man there is the dawning of a 
new and vital fact that the authority of law is 
resident in his own life; that health, strength, 
and happiness, as conditions of mind and body, 
must be made manifest through conscious effort 
on his part by the use of spiritual qualities and 
mind-faculties; that through the indwelling spirit^ 
his mind must be quickened and renewed and 
his body strengthened and made whole. 

In giving the contents of this book to the 
world the author earnestly hopes that the reader 
may find something that will prompt him to 
make a more serious and thoughtful study of 
life and its requirements. 

Faithfully yours, 
CHARLES BRODIE PATTERSON. 

OSCAWANA-ON-HUDSON, N. Y. 

NOTE TO THE FIFTH EDITION 

The author desires to thank the press and 
the public for their cordial reception of previ- 
ous editions. In this, the fifth presentation of 
the work, he has, in the addition of four new 
chapters, given his latest thought on the all- 
important subject of mental and physical 
health. 



CONTENTS 



What the New Thought Stands For, ... 9 

The Unity of Life, 22 

Demand and Supply, 30 

The Law of Attraction, 40 

Mental Influences, 47 

Freedom — Individual and Universal, .... 58 

Hearing and Doing, 69 

The Mission of Jesus, 79 

The Religion of Christ, 90 

Things Worth Remembering, 99 

. The Laws of Health, 108 

Spiritual Treatment, 115 

The Life of Power, 133 

Man — Past, Present, and Future, .... 142 

The Way of Salvation, 153 

The Kingdom of God, 160 

The Spirit of Praise, 170 

The Kingdom of Man, 181 

The Dawn of a New Age, 190 

The Controlled Life, 206 

S Health of Mind and Body, 224 

The Continuity of Life, 237 



THE WILL TO BE WELL 



WHAT THE NEW THOUGHT 
STANDS FOR 

" They grow too great 

For narrow creeds of right and wrong, which fade 
Before the unmeasured thirst for good: while peace 
Rises within them ever more and more. 
Such men are even now upon the earth." 

— Browning. 

" The truth is never in danger. Whether buried by friends 
or foes, it always rises again with a mightier vitality, a more 
resistless power, and a diviner glory. But the destruction of 
a half-truth or an old form of truth, is always necessary to the 
entrance and mastery of a larger truth in the life of the race. 
God suffers the destruction of states, churches, religions, 
sciences; not that men may be left without truth and knowl- 
edge and law; but that better laws and freer states and purer 
churches and wider knowledge and clearer visions of truth 
may arise to realize the kingdom of heaven upon the earth." 

— George D. Herron. 

Within the last twenty-five years two great 
movements, thoroughly idealistic in their ten- 
dencies, have taken root in our own country 
and are now spreading to the uttermost parts of 
the earth. One is known under the name of 
Christian Science, and was founded by Mary 

9 



io The Will to be Well 

Baker Glover Eddy; the other, which is now 
popularly known as the New Thought Move- 
ment, had as its first great apostle P. P. 
Quimby, of Portland, Me., and later Julius A. 
Dresser, of Boston, and Dr. W. F. Evans. Mr. 
Dresser taught and practised mental healing, 
and wrote but little. Dr. Evans wrote a num- 
ber of books, the most important being, "Prim- 
itive Mind Cure" and "Esoteric Christianity." 

It is not within the scope of this article to 
trace the history of these two great movements, 
but rather to show certain points wherein they 
agree or disagree. Fundamentally, there are 
certain beliefs held by them in common. The 
New Thought devotee as well as the Christian 
Scientist holds to the thought of the oneness of 
life — that all life is one life; that all knowledge 
is one — and that God is omniscient, omnipotent, 
and omnipresent. Starting with this funda- 
mental idea of life, it might be thought by some 
that the two bodies would reach virtually the 
same conclusions; but that there is a radical 
difference will be clearly shown in the following 
paragraphs. 

Let it be understood, first of all, that the 
writer does not attempt to discuss this subject in 
an antagonistic way, or from any desire to find 
fault with Christian Science. He recognizes the 
fact that there must be great vitality in a re^ 



What the New Thought Stands For n 



ligious system that has wrought such wonderful 
changes in the minds of thousands of people in 
so short a time, and is more than willing to give 
due credit to its founder for the truly marvelous 
work she has accomplished. There is no desire 
to be unjust, but merely to make a plain state- 
ment of the facts of the case. The writer has 
no thought of making any attack on Mrs. Eddy 
or her followers, and concerning the points 
wherein he seems to criticise will deal with cer- 
tain phases of their belief rather than with the 
work of any individual; for he is in general 
accord with their affirmative religion, or philos- 
ophy, but in direct opposition to their philos- 
ophy of denial, which he believes to be unchris- 
tian. He grants without question the good 
they have accomplished in healing the sick and 
in bringing greater happiness and peace into the 
lives of others. He believes, however, that this 
has been accomplished, not through any denial 
of matter, or of sin, sickness, and death, but 
through the presentation of the affirmative side 
of their religion — the oneness of life and the 
omnipotence of God. 

This article is written to make clear the dis- 
tinction between the New Thought Movement 
and Christian Science, as the question is so 
often asked, In what does the real difference 
consist? The first great point of divergence 



ia The Will to be Well 

appears when Christian Science affirms the 
whole material universe to be an illusion of 
what it terms "mortal mind," and that through 
the denial of matter one realizes one's spiritual 
origin. This is identical with the position held 
by many of the Hindu people, both of the past 
and the present time — that Maya (matter) is an 
illusion of mind. Of course, in this denial of 
matter the physical form of man is also denied 
away. 

The New Thought believer, on the other 
hand, looks upon the visible universe as an ex- 
pression of the power of God. He perceives 
that there must be an outer as well as an 
inner; that there must be effects as well as 
causes ; that all the great material universe is 
the visible word of God — God's word becoming 
manifest in material form; that the body of 
man, to some degree, represents man's spiritual 
and mental life; that by the influx of man's 
spiritual consciousness the mind is renewed, 
and the body strengthened and made whole. 
In this conception of the outer world, the New 
Thought believer claims to be in thorough 
accord with what the great Nazarene taught; 
because, while he said the flesh was of no profit 
in comparison with the spirit, yet he drew his 
greatest lessons from external nature. He 
said: "Consider the lilies of the field, how they 



What the New Thought Stands For 13 

grow." He pointed out how God has clothed 
the flowers with a beauty and perfection that 
man's highest art can not equal. He affirmed 
that God cared even for the grass of the field; 
and King David said : " Day unto day uttereth 
speech, and night unto night showeth knowl- 
edge. There is no speech nor language where 
their voice is not heard." 

Christian Science denies away sin, sickness, 
and death. The New Thought claims that all 
three have an existence, but an existence that is 
overcome, not through any process of denial, 
but through the introduction of true thought 
into the mind of man ; that to deny them away 
is to attribute the qualities of an entity to the 
very thing that is denied ; that, in order to deny 
anything away, it must first be pictured in the 
mind; and that, instead of putting it away, the 
mental picture is thus perpetuated. Jesus rec- 
ognized both sin and disease when he said: 
" Go, and sin no more, lest a worse thing befall 
thee." There is nothing in his teachings to 
show that he ever denied away either sin or dis- 
ease, but much to prove that he recognized both 
as conditions that should be overcome by good. 

Another point of difference between Christian 
Science and the New Thought Movement is the 
question of individual freedom — the God-given 
right to think and act for one's self. Christian 



i 4 The Will to be Well 

Science says, Read the Bible, and then take 
"Science and Health" as its interpreter. Leave 
all other sources of knowledge alone, it com- 
mands, because all else is the product of " mortal 
mind." The New Thought stands with the 
Apostle Paul, when he said : " Prove all things ; 
hold fast that which is good." Paul does not 
concede the right to any one else to do the 
thinking or the proving, believing that each 
mind must deal individually with the problems 
of life and thus work out its own salvation. 

Still another point of disagreement arises in 
the founding of church organizations. Christian 
Science, with its thoroughly organized follow- 
ing, has founded church after church. New 
Thought people think that we have churches 
enough; that we do not need religions made up 
of creeds and "beliefs" as urgently as we need a 
religion based upon the true worship of God — 
in spirit and in truth. The real temple of God 
is in the human soul; the New Thought Move- 
ment, therefore, does not stand for any ecclesi- 
astical or theological propaganda. It would 
bring to the minds of the people a knowledge 
of the laws that regulate and control life every- 
where; it would show that through perfect con- 
formity to the inner laws of life come perfect 
health and happiness, and that it is possible to 
manifest God's kingdom here and now. 



What the New Thought Stands For 15 

When we come to the healing of disease, a 
radical difference is found in that the Christian 
Science practitioner denies away disease and 
then affirms the oneness of life and of health, 
declaring that we are to draw our vitality from 
the one great Source ; while the New Thought 
practitioner stands fairly and squarely on the 
affirmative side of life. No such thing as denial 
enters the mind of the New Thought healer 
when he treats his patient. He recognizes all 
wrong mental conditions — malice, hatred, envy, 
jealousy, pride, sensuality, and kindred emotions 
— as indications of a lack of development, and 
perceives that with the introduction of affirm- 
ative thought no direct denial is needed: that 
the affirmation carries all necessary denial within 
itself. 

When the feeling of love enters the life, the 
false feeling of hate must go out; when the 
thought of law and order enters the mind, un- 
lawfulness and disorder can have no place. The 
New Thought healer affirms that all life is one ; 
that in God "we live and move and have our 
being;" that He has given to us all things — 
health, strength, and happiness. Every thought 
given by the healer is one of strength, of health, 
of beauty and loving-kindness; no disagreeable 
or unwholesome thought goes forth to the pa- 
tient, as would naturally be the case if the mind 



1 6 The Will to be Well 

of the healer were engaged in denying away 
mistakes that he hopes to overcome. We believe 
that our thoughts make us what we are; that 
it is indispensably necessary to keep the mind 
filled with clean, wholesome thought — and in so 
doing there is no room for contradictory ideas. 

To recapitulate: Christian Science and the 
New Thought agree that all life is one; that all 
intelligence is one; that God is the All in all. 

And they disagree on the following points: 
Christian Science says that the visible world is 
"mortal mind;" the New Thought declares the 
visible universe to be an expression of God's 
handiwork. Christian Science asserts that sin, 
sickness, and death have no existence ; the New 
Thought affirms that they have an existence, 
but their existence is only limited and their de- 
struction comes through right thinking and 
hence right living. Christian Science stands for 
a great religious sectarian organization ; it stands 
for slavery of the individual to an institution — 
at least at present. The New Thought stands 
for a knowledge of spiritual truth among all 
people and perfect freedom of the individual, in 
both thought and action, to live out the life that 
God intended him to live. Christian Science 
stands for a woman and a book; the New 
Thought Movement stands for God manifesting 
through the soul of man, for the eternal laws of 



What the New Thought Stands For 17 

creation, and for the absolute freedom of the 
individual to work out his own salvation. Chris- 
tian Science stands for a treatment of disease 
that includes both a negative and an affirmative 
philosophy; the New Thought in its treatment 
of disease rests on the omnipotence of God as the 
one and only healing power of the universe, and 
is therefore thoroughly and solely affirmative. 

Having pointed out the distinctions that ex- 
ist between the two movements as the writer 
sees them, let us briefly outline the New 
Thought and what it stands for, even though it 
may be necessary to repeat a few statements 
already made in order to give a clear, compre- 
hensive view of the movement. We do not 
believe that the New Thought had its origin 
in the mind of any one particular person or 
number of persons, but that it is as old as the 
soul itself. It is God's truth seeking to become 
manifest in the individual life. We believe, 
however, that Jesus Christ showed forth the 
great yet simple truths of life in as clear and 
comprehensive a manner as they have ever 
been given to the world. Yet we do not believe 
that he was the only great prophet of God, but 
that all peoples have had their prophets — that 
Buddha, Krishna, Mohammed, Zoroaster, and 
Confucius were prophets of God, and brought 
life and understanding to the people. 



18 The Will to be Well 

The New Thought teaches the universality 
of religion; that God's spirit is more or less 
active in the minds of all people, and that each 
individual receives according to his desires and 
needs; that there is a natural evolutionary 
process in the life of man, and little by little 
he is unfolding to latent powers and possibili- 
ties; that the ideal man already exists, but the 
ideal is still seeking perfect expression; that 
man grows as naturally as does the plant or 
the tree, and that there is law and order from 
beginning to end; that law is universal, and 
it is through knowledge of universal law that 
man brings his life into oneness with the uni- 
versal life — into a condition of harmony 
wherein he expresses both health and happi- 
ness. 

There are different stages of religious devel- 
opment, as there are different stages of phys- 
ical, mental, and spiritual growth. On one 
plane of religion, man lives a purely sensuous 
life; on another, the mind becomes enamored 
of creeds and rituals formulated by the human 
mind ; on a third, man worships God in spirit 
and in truth. I believe there is no religion in 
the world devoid of truth — that the truth it 
contains is that which holds it together; that 
all mankind is working for a single end; that, 
although we have differences in the present, they 



VvCto 
What the New Thought Stands For 19 

exist rather in form than in spirit, and will grad- 
ually melt away. We would rejoice with all 
people when they rejoice. In whatever way 
any body of people, calling themselves Christian 
Scientists or by any other name, bring greater 
happiness and a higher and truer knowledge of 
life to others, instead of finding fault, let us 
gladly indorse that which they have accom- 
plished. We know that whatever good is 
wrought is of the Spirit of God — in both 
thought and work. 

In defining the principles professed by the 
New Thought followers, we are free to admit 
that they do not always adhere to their highest 
ideals; but exception should not be taken to the 
law, but rather to the failure to live up to its re- 
quirements. The New Thought teaches that we 
should live from the center of life outward ; that 
we should recognize the power of God working 
within us to will and to do. There should be 
such an outflow of faith and love and hope from 
the soul into the mind of man that his thought 
would really become transfigured, his body 
transformed, and God's kingdom expressed "on 
earth as it is in heaven." We believe that any 
reform that shall ever come into the world will 
not be through a work that deals solely with the 
external life, but will have its inception in the 
heart — in the soul and life — of man; that there 



20 The Will to be Well 

is no problem in life that can not be solved 
through a knowledge of the law of God — as it 
is written in the heart of man — and obedience 
thereto. The New Thought stands for a vital 
Christianity that goes to the very heart of 
things; that pays no attention to the letter or 
the form, but creates both letter and form for 
itself in perfect accord with the inner word. 

We have, therefore, no desire to build up any 
sectarian organization or to tear down any that 
now exists. We would say, with Paul, that "the 
unknown God whom ye ignorantly worship, 
Him we declare unto you." God — who is in all, 
through all, and above all — worketh within you 
to will and to do. Having no sectarian organi- 
zation, yet offering the right hand of fellowship 
to members of all religious denominations; 
having no belief in creed or dogma, yet recog- 
nizing the full rights of all who desire and feel 
the need of both: the New Thought Movement 
has not come to destroy but to fulfill. It has 
not come to tear down, but to build up; yet 
that building will not be made by the hands of 
man, but will abide in the hearts of the people 
— wherein their minds will become strengthened 
and their bodies made whole. 

While the movement is an aggressive one, it 
would antagonize no body of people. It is 
aggressive for the fundamental position it takes, 



What the New Thought Stands For 21 

being affirmative from beginning to end. It 
affirms the omnipotence, omniscience, and omni- 
presence of God — with all that these words 
imply. It stands for a gospel of peace and 
good-will to all men. It is optimistic through- 
out. It declares that it is easier for man to be 
well and happy than to be the reverse. It is 
easier to go with the law than to put one's self 
in opposition to it. Losing the idea of itself as 
a sectarian religion, it finds itself in reality a 
universal religion. 




THE UNITY OF LIFE 

'* No human eyes Thy face may see j 

No human thought Thy form may know J 
But all creation dwells in Thee, 

And Thy great life through all doth flow." 

— T. W. HlGGINSON. 

14 Oh. the little birds sang east, and the little birds sang west, 
And I smiled to think God's greatness flowed around our 

incompleteness, 
Round our restlessness, His rest." _ Mrs Browwng# 

In our study of the science of life, we should 
always bear in mind that the universe is gov- 
erned by law, in each and every part. Nothing 
is exempt from the operation of law — from the 
atom to the sun. 

When we make a careful study of law in re- 
lation to man we find that it is founded on love, 
because whenever we conform to the law of love 
every result is good — it benefits and helps us in 
every way, far beyond our anticipations; but 
when we act in opposition to it we get results 
that are not beneficial. The one who obeys the 
law is blessed; the one who does not obey is 
not blessed. 

Put two healthy plants of the same species in 
boxes filled with earth ; place them in the sun- 

22 



The Unity of Life 23 

light, water one of the plants and allow the other 
to go without water. In a number of days you 
will find one plant all shriveled up by the sun and 
the other growing luxuriantly. The difference 
in their condition is due to the relation of the 
plants to the sun. One is benefited by the heat 
and light; the other through lack of care on 
your part has its form destroyed. The power 
that gives life to the plant can also destroy it, 
and so we may receive vitality from the omnip- 
otent Source of all life and yet not receive the 
fulness that is our due because of wrong rela- 
tions to that Source. Our life is like that of the 
withered plant — in a condition not in accord 
with Nature. When we are in harmony with 
law we grow just as unconsciously, in one sense, 
as does the plant. 

We make a great many useless efforts to 
grow, but when we understand the laws of life 
and conform thereto our growth is natural and 
without struggle. Yet we need to recognize the 
fact that we have something to do — to get all 
the knowledge of true living that we can, and 
then to make proper use of it. We are far from 
wise when we seek knowledge merely for its 
own sake; but we show wisdom when we seek 
knowledge in order that we may use it. It is 
required of us that we relate ourselves to the 
world about us in the right way. How are we 



24 The Will to be Well 

related to it? How are we related to God and 
to our fellow-man ? These are some of the great 
questions of life. 

Let us first consider our relation to God. The 
soul is differentiated spirit; that is, each soul 
contains within itself a picture (or image) of the 
great universal soul. All divine possibilities 
and all qualities are in the soul — the God love, 
the God life, the God power. The universal 
soul is the all-comprehensive Soul. Everything 
that is in God enters into the human soul; thus 
does God seek expression through the life of 
man. When we give expression to the Godlike 
qualities within us, the individual soul comes into 
conscious relationship with the universal soul, 
and we begin to realize that the soul is at one 
with God — one in faith, one in purpose, and one 
in love. 

We only begin to live as we realize our soul- 
life; then we begin to see the unity of life in the 
world about us. We see that everything is re- 
lated to everything else and that we ourselves 
are related to every part — that there is no sep- 
aration between our own lives and the lives of 
others. Our neighbor is ourself. We are mem- 
bers one of another. Only as each individual 
sees his relation to the great Whole does he 
become thoroughly helpful. 

We can see, therefore, how much depends 



The Unity of Lift 25 

upon the way in which we relate ourselves to 
mankind. In doing for others we do for God 
and for ourselves. If this view of life were more 
widely taken, all dissensions and all " hard feel- 
ings," all bitter and unkind words, would pass 
away, and we should no more think of finding 
fault with another than of criticising some organ 
of the body. 

If the body were weak or diseased, we would 
try to overcome that condition by giving it more 
care and thought. We should do the same with 
our fellow-men. Instead of finding fault with 
those who injure us, we should reflect that 
anger, strife, and discord are unreal things ; that 
they appear only on the surface of life; that 
they never enter the soul of man. The real self 
does not express these conditions; they are 
images that we picture in our minds because we 
believe in the separateness of God and man. 
When we realize that we are not separate, but 
all one, we shall not think anything of the unkind 
word or deed, because we know it proceeds from 
unreality and will pass away as we express more 
and more of God's own image and likeness. 

If we take this view of life, we shall find that 
the little things that have disturbed us in the 
past will have no power over us in any way. 
We shall keep on doing good, whatever other 
people may do. The Christ law is that we 



26 The Will to be Well 

should do good to others, and we can only do 
that when we recognize the oneness and unity 
of life. When we look at the individual life as 
separate or detached, we see a great many things 
that seem to be wrong in the outer world. In 
one sense they are wrong, but sometimes through 
wrong-doing we learn how to do right. We 
learn the law of God through the results that 
follow its infraction. We know the truth by 
that which contradicts it. 

Much time is wasted in lamenting the evil 
condition of the world, but the world is not 
made better by such lamentation. A thought 
that is not productive of good is idle, and the 
sooner one gets rid of it the better. The true 
way to help the world is to let one's light so 
shine that others may see and learn. 

As we try to bring our lives into harmony 
with eternal law, we often find that we have 
formed bad habits; and when we try to get rid 
of them it seems almost impossible, and we 
wonder why this is. It is because we are re- 
lated to the rest of mankind. There is a law of 
attraction. When we form certain habits and con- 
tinue them until they have become thoroughly 
established in mind, we have through the power 
of thought related ourselves to all people think- 
ing and doing the things that have occupied our 
attention. Those others are our real relatives. 



The Unity of Lift 17 

Suppose it has been our habit to take excep- 
tion to people who differ with us. Suppose it 
has been our custom to find fault with people 
who it seemed to us were not doing right 
Through this critical habit all the fault-finding 
people of the world have become related to us, 
and the effect of this relationship is that if we 
try to give up fault-finding there is an impulse 
that leads us to continue to criticise others. 
That impulse is the power of other minds, related 
to us, acting upon our own. Until we break 
off that relationship and establish a new one the 
result will be the same. If we form a habit of 
thinking kindly and saying kind words, in a short 
time we become mentally related to all kindly- 
natured people in the world, and it becomes much 
easier to say a kind word and do a kind deed 
than the reverse. This is because we have all the 
force of loving thoughts pouring into our lives. 

To be well and strong let us take this thought: 
"It is right that I should be well and strong. 
God is the Source of my life ; in Him I live and 
move and have my being. I have no life apart 
from God ; He is my strength and my help, and 
everything is mine because it is God's." By let- 
ting the mind dwell on this and similar thoughts, 
little by little we establish a relationship with 
all healthy minds, and all our thoughts become 
filled with health (harmony). A mind is only 



s8 The Will U be Well 

sane as it sees and knows that " all is of God 
that is or is to be, and God is good." 

By viewing life in this way we become related 
to all this order of thought; it keeps pouring in 
upon us, and we become strong and vigorous 
and express health and poise. We see the 
brightness of life, the joy of living, and the joy 
of being in the world and doing good. 

We can not easily break away from these re- 
lationships of life if they have once been thor- 
oughly fixed. It is only through persistent 
effort that this can be done, but the reader 
should not think that because he has tried once 
and failed he can not succeed. Any one can 
overcome any condition. If little by little we 
have been building up an environment of sick- 
ness and disease, we have the power to over- 
come it ; the only question is as to whether we 
will use that power. Power is given to us to be 
thoroughly well and strong, to be thoroughly 
poised, and to do God's will in everything — not 
in some things, but in everything. We are all 
equal to it so far as we know God's will; and 
that is all that is expected, because if we do the 
will we shall "know of the doctrine" — we shall 
know the truth. 

We are equal to everything that presents 
itself in life ; otherwise it would not present itself 
to us. The very fact that a duty to perform 



The Unity of Life 2 9 

comes to us shows that we have the power to 
do it; otherwise it would not come. Each and 
every one of us is confronted by something, and 
the problem that seems the largest one to us to- 
day is the one for us to solve — if we will only 
let ourselves do this. It makes no difference 
how hard it seems to be; the fact that we can 
do what we will remains true. It is not, how- 
ever, according to the weak, human will, but 
through the recognition of the universal will 
acting in and through us, that we can express 
what we desire to express. When we will in 
God's will to do things right, we can do all 
things; for no ideal can enter His mind to 
which He can not give expression. 




DEMAND AND SUPPLY 

"Life is a train of moods like a string of beads, and, as 
we pass through them, they prove to be many-colored lenses 
which paint the world in their own hue, and each shows only 
what lies in its focus. From the mountain you see the moun- 
tain. * * * Human life is made up of two elements, 
power and form, and the proportion must be invariably kept, 
if we would have it sweet and sound. * * * Onward and 
onward ! In liberated moments we know that a new picture 
of life and duty is already possible,'* Emerson 

*' Believe then in your own inner spiritual nature. Believe 
in its divine right to rule your life in accordance with your 
highest ideals. Believe in your power to fix your attention 
where you choose and to take an interest in what you choose. 
Believe that every longing of your soul contains its own 
prophecy of fulfilment, and act as though you knew that ful- 
filment to be at hand." -Harriet B. Bradbury. 

Life is made up of little acts rather than of 
great ones. The little things we do day by day 
constitute the real sum of life. In our haste to 
accomplish definite results in the world we forget 
about the little things in our desire to accomplish 
the great things, and we fail in the latter because 
we do not know how to achieve the former. 
There is nothing so trivial in life as to be un- 
worthy of consideration. We should understand 
life so as to make our thoughts clear even to little 
children; to do away so far as practicable with 

30 



Demand and Supply 31 

the complex side of life; to be as simple-minded 
as possible; to keep the mind free from all things 
that tend to tangle or clog it. We should start 
with the thought of God — God in all life; God in 
our own individual lives. We should not go 
through life trying to keep ourselves separate 
from the world in which we live, feeling that 
because we have some knowledge of divine law 
we are above our fellow-men. We should rather 
go through the world in the spirit of helpfulness 
— giving and receiving. 

No matter how evil a thing may seem to be, 
if we examine the root of it we will find God 
there. No matter how bad a man may seem to 
be, if we can reach his soul we will find God 
there. And it will make us more charitable, 
because we will see that the evil of life is only 
on the surface, where change and growth are 
forever taking place — where we make mistakes, 
sometimes wilfully and sometimes unconsciously, 
yet knowing that through such errors we profit 
in the end. Then let us think the God thought 
of life in everything — in our dealings with our 
fellows, with children, and with animals. Let us 
try to see God in mind and also in Nature, 
because God is in both. We should try to see 
God first in our own lives, for then we shall see 
Him in everything — everything is expressing 
God. Let us try to be wise, because when we 



32 The Will to be Well 

have the wisdom of God in our own minds we 
shall find it in everything; for God's law z> in 
everything, and everything moves in accordance 
with it. 

Sometimes things seem to be deflected from 
their natural course, yet everything moves ulti- 
mately in its natural order. We know that the 
earth in its circuit round the sun is deflected from 
its path as it passes a greater planet, but having 
passed it is no longer deflected. We should not 
get discouraged about things that seem to fail. 
There are no failures in the plan of God. Failure 
at its worst is only seeming. Everything is pro- 
gressing toward a definite end. Vicissitudes are 
inevitable; therefore, discouragement should 
never enter into the mind of man. It is the inner 
life that is important, not that on the surface; 
it is the inner which is really trying to express 
itself outwardly, and frequently failing to do it 
perfectly. Perfect expression comes through 
effort that is not strained, but directed when the 
mind is in a state of peace and rest. We succeed 
only when we put the restless, anxious side of 
affairs out of mind and allow the restful side to 
dwell in our thoughts. 

Consider the brightness and the joy of living. 
We do not pay enough attention to these. There 
is not enough brightness in the world; yet when 
we consider things as they really are there is 



Demand and Supply 33 

every reason to be happy, to be joyful. To know 
this is to display both joy and happiness, which 
are aspects of the spirit of God. We hear 
them in the song of the bird ; we feel them in 
the perfume of every flower. There is happi- 
ness, there is joyousness in Nature. 

We should appear bright and happy by show- 
ing forth the inner brightness and the inner joy 
of living, because we are working out a great 
problem that will bring us into a more harmoni- 
ous and beautiful condition of life; and we should 
work from that condition outward in a spirit of 
joy and satisfaction in what we are doing. We 
should take pride in the thought that something 
has been given us to do. We have found most 
satisfaction in having things done for us — in not 
having things to do ourselves. It seems so hard 
when everything might be accomplished in a 
much easier way. It is a poor quality of mind 
that seeks to have everything done for it; it is a 
lazy life that longs for any such condition. Is it 
not far better to meet each thing in the proper 
spirit as it presents itself, and thus overcome it 
and gain a higher and truer conception of life? 

We have been given a mind and a heart with 
which to think and feel, and it is through think- 
ing and feeling that we must for ourselves work 
out a beautiful salvation ; that is, the beautiful 
'ife that has been given us to develop. When 



34 The Will to be Well 

we are discouraged we are thinking in opposi- 
tion to the divine law. 

We nave not been conscious of this, perhaps, 
and consequently little has been expected of us ; 
but just so soon as the truth enters our con- 
sciousness, more is required of us. Whenever 
we do anything that fills our minds with a sense 
of bitterness, or prejudice, or worry, or anxiety, 
or causes us to meditate on our "physical weak- 
ness," or see in others disagreeable qualities, we 
are putting ourselves in opposition to the law of 
God. We are not living our real lives. We are 
not working out our salvation in the way in- 
tended, but rather through self-imposed trials 
and tribulations. All these negative conditions 
adversely affect the mind, and consequently the 
body, and we wonder wrry God is so much bet- 
ter to other people than to us ! God is just as 
good to us as we deserve, 

We must make a demand for the things we 
wish. The plant makes its demand, and receives 
everything necessary to sustain and perfect its 
life. We should make our demands consciously. 
We must first know what we want, and then feel 
perfectly sure that it is ours, that we need it and 
that we have it. 

Let this apply to everything in life, but keep 
the unselfish side always foremost. It is not 
selfish to demand health and strength for one's 



Demand and Supply 35 

self; but a demand for worldly possessions hav- 
ing no reference to others' needs might become 
supremely selfish. In order to be helpful to 
others we must be healthy and strong. 

There is nothing selfish, therefore, in de- 
manding everything needful to make us rightly 
related to the world and to our fellow-men. 
Taking this position we eliminate selfishness. 
We demand for ourselves and for others, insist- 
ing that it is right; that it does not deprive any 
one else; that it is for our own good and for 
that of others. All things are ours to use, not 
to abuse. By indulging in such thoughts we 
attract to ourselves everything necessary to our 
well-being — happiness, health, strength, friends. 
We may not receive at once the things desired, 
but we should cultivate patience and rest assured 
that they will come to us in due time and in a 
way that will do us the greatest possible good. 
Thus we tend to eliminate impatience from our 
minds. 

But with patience there should also be perse- 
verance. Some say if you only "wait" your de- 
sire will come to you; but nothing comes to 
those who put forth no effort on their own be- 
half. Keep right on thinking and doing, and 
little by little true results will accrue. It is 
never well, in our perseverance, to introduce the 
element of haste. We should strive to see every 



36 The Will to be Well 

side of a question. Sometimes we listen to one 
side and turn a deaf ear to the other. We must 
learn how to judge, and we can only judge 
rightly when we know all that is to be known 
on any subject; otherwise our judgment can not 
be the God judgment, which always considers 
all the facts. It is necessary to keep the mind 
free, because if it is not free we are certain to err. 

Whatever we think of others has its reflex 
action on ourselves, because what we think for 
others they in turn think for us. Judgment of 
others rests with God, but does not rest between 
man and man. It should not be our practice to 
judge any life other than our own, but it is right 
for us to judge whether the principle manifested 
is in accord with the divine law; that is, it is not 
a question of personal judgment with us, but 
rather a question of understanding God's law. 
It is necessary to distinguish between person and 
principle. That is sometimes difficult, because we 
are prone to associate the two — the individual 
and the act — in our mental concepts. One per- 
son may perform a reprehensible act in the best 
possible spirit, while another, in the wrong spirit, 
may do something that is right in itself but lack- 
ing in good motive. 

We must learn to distinguish between things 
and persons, therefore, and leave the judgment 
of individuals to God, because God judges each 



Demand and Supply 37 

soul. If we violate any law of life, then our 
condemnation only ceases when we cease doing 
wrong. Just so soon as we begin to do right, 
forgiveness ensues. 

Suppose your friend is disobeying the law, 
and you conclude that he is about to reverse 
his steps ; just so soon as he alters his course his 
sin is forgiven. In all forms of sickness the 
mind is the first to get well — the body last. 
The sin must first be forgiven, and then the body 
will respond. Sometimes we feel that it is very__ 
Jiard to jbrgiye-^ yet while one is fojrgivjiig__ 
another he is forgiving himself. And it is only 
when we forgive the whole world, through the 
mind of God, that we are really forgiven. Only; 
in prorjortipn as we forgive are we fbrgiijeft^ 

We should acquire a fuller understanding of 
the nature of the soul, so that we may enter into 
a higher order — a wider comprehension of life. 
We truly serve and worship God when we recog- 
nize any element of the God life in another. 
Man is the highest expression of God, and we 
must learn to love one another. We must know 
something of the All in all before we can enter 
into the lives of others and be thoroughly help- 
ful to them, because if we do not know what 
they feel and think we can not be of service to 
them. Let us first know ourselves — our own 
thoughts and our own methods — and then feel 



38 The Will to be Well 

that they are identical with those of other 

people. 

Thus we shall learn to excuse our neighbors' 
failings. Sometimes, on meeting people for the 
first time, we seem to experience a spirit of re- 
sentment toward them, without knowing why. 
That condition can only be overcome by culti- 
vating its opposite and becoming thoroughly 
sympathetic. Everything in life can thus be 
made simple. In this way we ourselves grow 
strong and demonstrate the real power of life — 
the power of God within us. 

We meet two persons — one is very "good" 
and the other very "bad." Which one most 
needs our help ? The Christ thought is to ad- 
minister good where it is needed the most. That 
is why he went among the people who were the 
sinners and outcasts. He spent his life among 
the lowliest, his object being to do good to them 
because they felt their need. We waste a great 
deal of time over persons — friends and enemies 
— who are not willing to receive good. We 
have many lessons yet to learn from the life of 
Jesus. If any one is in need of what we have to 
give, and his appeal is made to us, we should 
hold ourselves in readiness to aid him. In the 
physical life there are those in need of material 
necessities, but sometimes we give to those not 
in need, which is to scatter seed by the wayside, 



Demand and Supply 39 

or on the rocks, or among the thorns — with 
fruitless results. There should always be some 
actual need where our bounty is bestowed. 

We do not trust one another enough in life. We 
are prone to construe things in the wrong way 
Sometimes the highest and holiest things in life 
are regarded as the worst. It is very seldom 
that we try to view anything from another's 
point of view. There is no lesson more impor- 
tant than to learn that we must put ourselves in 
others' places in order to discern things in the 
right way. 

"I have been in this New Thought a great 
many years, and yet I am not strong. I try to 
live the New Thought; I believe in it, but I get 
no results." How often we hear this complaint! 
When it becomes to us a law we get the true 
results, but not until then. When we get life in 
its fulness we have as much as any one else. 
This can be procured only through right think- 
ing and right doing. We will never get health 
or strength while meditating on our own imper- 
fections or the weaknesses of others. Only as 
we dwell on the beauty of life and know that God 
is working within us to will and to do, and that 
the will of God is a vital factor in each and 
every life, may we have health, happiness, and 
every other needful thing. 



THE LAW OF ATTRACTION 

"Life is made up, not of great sacrifices or duties, but of 
little things in which smiles and kindnesses and small obliga- 
tions, given habitually, are what win and preserve the heart 
and secure comfort." 

— Sir Humphrey Davy. 

•' The end of life is to be like unto God; and the soul fol- 
lowing God will be like unto Him: He being the beginning, 

middle, and end of all things." 

— Socrates. 

" Like attracts like." There is something 
kindred between steel and iron and the magnet 
that attracts and holds them; for without that 
relationship there would be no attraction. 

The activities we observe in the outer world 
are but typical of that which is taking place in 
man's inner world of thought and feeling, the 
outer being the external expression of the in- 
visible law of God. That law is universal few 
will question; that it has a definite effect upon 
the life of man is conceded by all. It is possi- 
ble, however, that in our investigations hitherto 
we have paid too much attention to the outer 
manifestation, thereby losing sight of the law 
that finds its highest expression in the human 
mind and heart. Whatever qualities of thought 
or feeling we may have developed in life, sym- 

40 












The Law of Attraction 41 

pathetically they tend to relate us to the same 
order of development in other people and have 
the effect of calling forth into a more vital exist- 
ence these kindred qualities. "None of us liveth 
to himself and no man dieth to himself." We 
are so related to one another that there is among 
us in continual operation an alternate outflow 
and influx — and the latter inevitably partakes of 
the qualities of the former. 

"Like attracts like." Upon the recognition 
of this law depend health and happiness, because 
neither can ensue unless in our thought we give 
out both. The strong, wholesome thoughts we 
think, the kind feelings we have, the bright, 
joyous hopes we entertain — these are so many 
qualities going out from us to unite with the 
same qualities in other people, thus making it 
easier, both for them and for us, to comply with 
all the true requirements of life. 

No matter what we wish to be or to do, through 
recognition of and conformity to this principle 
of attraction it becomes possible. By virtue of 
this law we make our own environment, realizing 
through the inner knowledge of life that we 
have the power to shape its outer conditions 
and to establish a new and higher order of 
things, so that the old thought of being con- 
trolled by circumstances or fate or any external 
condition passes away, and we awaken to a 



V 



4 a The Will to be Well 

knowledge of our inherent dominion and power. 
We use this knowledge, moreover, both for our 
own benefit and that of others, because any 
action on our part that tends to bring real good 
into our own lives must necessarily have a cor- 
responding action on those sympathetically re- 
lated to us. 

If people would only pay attention to the 
operation of this law in their own lives they 
would quickly realize the importance of a thor- 
ough knowledge thereof and of its practical 
utility. Let us consider a few illustrations that 
show its effect. 

A deep interest in any special subject is suffi- 
cient to bring us almost immediately in contact 
with persons whom we have not met nor cared 
for in the past. How it is brought about we 
hardly know; but in a short time we become 
surrounded by persons interested in the same 
subject. The interchange of thought and idea 
works for the good of all. The very object of 
our coming together is that there may be a 
mutual giving and receiving. The quality of 
our thought places us where we belong. A 
man that has faith in a beneficent Creator, who 
works through law for a perfect end, or the 
ultimate perfection of all things — 

"One far-off, divine event 
Xo which the whole creation moves," 



The Law of Attraction 43 

— has acquired the first element necessary to 
bring about a complete action of law in his own 
life. 

The next thing in order would be the feeling 
of confidence and faith in humanity in general; 
but this should be especially true of those with 
whom we are brought in intimate contact, so 
that the trust and faith we repose in them may- 
be felt by them. Again, faith in one's self, one's 
aims and objects, clearness of vision to see 
aright, perfect faith and trust in one's own 
ability to accomplish the desired end — these all 
tend to set in motion forces inherent in one's 
own being, so that their action upon others is of 
that quality that serves to waken and renew the 
same innate power. 

We now have something of the element of 
success to start with, but we wish to be success- 
ful in the highest and truest way. Let us, 
therefore, introduce still other qualities; let us 
fill the mind with hopefulness. Hope is just as 
requisite as faith in the upbuilding of character 
or the promotion of success. Our hope tends 
to make others hopeful. Doubt saps one's 
vitality, and doubt is best overcome by hope. 
Faith and hope, however, without love, were 
barren qualities. Love is the greatest of all, 
because it includes all. " Love is the fulfilling of 
the law"; because whatever we do through the 



44 



The Will to be Well 



spirit of love will not be done through opposi- 
tion to the law of life, but in perfect conformity 
to it. Pope says : 

" Self-love but serves the virtuous mind to wake, 
As the small pebble stirs the peaceful lake." 

Love of self is good in its proper place, but it 
ceases to be love when one ignores the greater 
call to love and serve God through loving ser- 
vice to humanity. We should always subordi- 
nate the lesser to the greater, but that does not 
call for the doing away of the lesser. It calls 
rather for a perfect adjustment, wherein the self 
shall recognize and conform to the universal 
self. We now have the real riches of life ; but, 
as all inner states find outer expression sooner 
or later, we see these inner riches expressed in 
many ways and degrees. The faith, hope, and 
love we have for humanity become living seeds 
sown in the hearts and minds of others. Spring- 
ing up in and beautifying their lives, they bring 
forth fruit abundantly, so that all that has been 
given out by us has returned to us a hundred- 
fold. 

Our faith and hope and love take shape in a 
material way — i. e., they relate themselves to 
form, giving beauty of color and harmony to 
external surroundings, so that to a degree the 
earth becomes transformed into a paradise. The 
mountains appeal to us in a way they never did 



The Law of Attraction 45 

before; the valley and meadow reflect a new- 
beauty; the river and brooklet impart new 
qualities of brightness and joy; the ocean, in 
calm and storm, conveys to our minds the great- 
ness, the strength, and the freedom of life ; the 
sun reminds us of that Power that gives of its 
own life and intelligence to every living, moving 
thing. And the moon, as the reflector of light, 
brings to us the thought that only as we reflect 
the universal love and become one with it are 
we truly related to God and humanity; that the 
inner law is that the soul must follow God as a 
plant follows the sun; that when the spirit of 
truth illumines the life, then from such inner 
illumination will God's word, as it is written 
without in all Nature, be revealed to man, and 
the things that have been long hidden shall be 
known — not as we have believed them to be in 
the past, but as they are in reality. 

Thus shall we attract to us everything that 
heart and mind can desire; for the heaven re- 
alized within shall become manifest without. 
This is not an idle dream : it is what the proph- 
ets and the enlightened ones of every clime and 
age have taught. 

Thousands of souls are looking forward to 
the coming of a new era, when the Christ king- 
dom — the reign of righteousness, justice, and 
truth — shall be realized on earth. Let every 



4 6 



The Will to be Well 



one know that the hastening of this greatly-to- 
be-desired end is to be sought primarily through 
individual effort, which shall tend first to call 
into existence latent good on the part of the 
individual, so that the necessary conditions may 
exist for the natural action of one mind upon the 
minds of others. And who can foresee what the 
result will be? The time will come when the 
inner unity — the oneness of life — will be as fully 
manifest outwardly as it now exists interiorly, 

" Like attracts like." Man must give expres- 
sion to the God within him. " If he called them 
gods, unto whom the word of God came, and 
the Scripture can not be broken." The desire 
to express more of this Godlikeness will not 
only bring us into a closer relationship to Deity, 
but will make us more truly useful to one an- 
other. And in the fulness of time, through 
knowledge of the law and desire to give perfect 
expression thereto, we shall attain to the meas- 
ure of the fulness of the stature of Christ. 




MENTAL INFLUENCES 

•■ The outer is always the shadow and form of the inner; 
the present is the fulness of the past, and the herald of the 

future -" — MOZOOMDAR. 

" Every right action and true thought sets the seal of 
its beauty on person and face." Ruskin 

4 * Exercise the mind with contemplation and the body 
with action and so preserve the health of both. " 

— Confucius. 

Very few persons have an adequate concep- 
tion of the wonderful power exerted by their 
thoughts. All of us know something of the 
action of thought upon others, and also of the 
action of thought upon ourselves; but this 
knowledge is usually very limited. We do not 
realize the tremendous influence that we are 
exerting every minute of our lives — an influence 
that makes for good, for strength and happi- 
piness, both to ourselves and others; yet this 
influence can also produce ill effects. 

We do not understand the thoroughness of 
our relationship to our fellow-men. We do not 
realize that we are members one of another. 
We regard ourselves individually as being sep- 
arate and detached from all other personalities ; 
yet there is no detachment — there is no separa- 

47 



48 The Will to be Well 

tion. Each and every one of us is a part of one 
life principle — a controlling and directing su- 
preme intelligence — which is omnipotent and is 
imparted to every entity in the universe accord- 
ing to its need or demand. So we may have 
health, strength, and intelligence to the measure 
of our fullest requirements; but we must make 
our demand in accordance with the eternal law. 

If we would successfully accomplish any 
undertaking we must closely follow the law that 
regulates such activities. In life, if we would be 
strong, whole, and happy, we must understand 
more of this law that regulates life and learn to 
conform thereto. We find that everything in 
life has its own vital center whence it develops 
outward. In the past we tried to reverse this 
eternal order by working from the circumference 
toward the center. This, perhaps, was right 
enough until, in the course of evolution, we 
learned that there was a better way to grow 
than that of working from the outer to the inner. 

Let us accept the Master's word that "the 
kingdom of God is within" — that the center of 
power is within our own souls; that man is in 
every way superior to anything in the external 
world, and that to him were given dominion and 
power over all things. Has he exercised that 
authority? No; he trembles at many things in 
the outer world. His mind is filled with fears 



-h- 



Mental Influences 49 

of all kinds. He has not come into dominion 
and power, because he has not achieved this 
ascendency over his own life, and because all 
true dominion and power begin at the very soul 
of things — in the life of man. 

In the past we have tried to shape our lives 
in accord with external things ; we have sought 
to develop peace and harmony in the outer 
world while neglecting inner harmony and inner 
peace. ^" Enter into thy closet, and * * * 
shut thy door." These are the words of Jesus. 
What does he mean ? He means that there is an 
inner consciousness of life. We must ignore 
the external life for the time being in order to 
connect with the power that is within the soul 
of man. " Ye are the temple of God, and the 
Spirit of God dwelleth in you." Where shall 
we seek God save in our own souls ? We must 
know Him therein before we can recognize Him 
as expressed in the external world. We must 
go to the very Source to know the power of 
God, and to realize it in our own lives. ^ 

Some have deceived themselves by thinking 
that, if they had certain external possessions, 
nothing more was necessary. They consider 
themselves true Christians ; yet the true Chris- 
tian is he that follows in the Master's steps. 
God is Spirit, and they that worship Him must 
worship Him in spirit and in truth. God requires 



5 o The Will to be Well 

no external adoration from any soul. The wor- 
ship that is true is an expression of God in the 
inner life of man ; hence, we may conform per- 
fectly to every external form — to every creed in 
Christendom — and still know nothing about the 
religion of Jesus Christ. The religion of the 
Master is one that produces wholeness and heals 
the sick. It is liberty — and this is why it brings 
the believer into a greater freedom than he can 
otherwise enjoy. 

Jesus said to his disciples : " Go ye into all 
the world and preach the gospel to every crea- 
ture, and as you go heal the sick, cleanse the 
lepers," etc. It is not enough merely to preach 
the gospel, Something more is necessary — the 
healing of the sick. The gospel of Christ does 
this. When the truths of being enter the life of 
man, and he realizes their force — that the word 
of God in his inmost life is to assure freedom 
and peace — this inner mental passivity gives 
perfect physical harmony and strength. We 
can only obtain peace by recognizing this inner 
center of being and striving to work therefrom 
outward. 

Whence do we get the force of life ? Do we 
find it in the external world? No; neither is it 
contained in the things we eat or drink. There 
is a higher than physical food necessary in the 
life of man, and if we lack this we virtually starve 



Mental Influences 51 

to death, even in this world. There is no real 
assimilation or digestion of physical things. As 
our bodies are in reality the summing up of our 
thinking, they are strong only when we have 
wholesome thoughts. We make our bodies 
what we will to make them when we observe 
the laws of life. We may realize this so thor- 
oughly that we can have our heaven here on 
earth. God has given us this power to use in 
such a way that it will bring us health and 
happiness. 

It is essential, then, that we should start right 
by carefully considering the underlying prin- 
ciples of the science of life — the truths in which 
Christian people have asserted belief for many 
centuries. What are these principles ? First, 
there is but one power in the universe — Omnip- 
otence. Even those claiming to be materialists 
recognize this power. Herbert Spencer asserts 
that. we are in the presence of an infinite Power, 
which governs all things, and material scientists 
everywhere are coming to believe in an omnip- 
otent God. Every atom of force in the universe 
represents God's power — everything to some 
degree is an expression thereof. Yet we must 
distinguish between power and its expression — 
between subject and object. In the great uni- 
verse all knowledge is God's and in its develop- 
ment shows that all things are manifestations of 



52 The Will to be Well 

Omnipotence. This infinite power, while om- 
nipresent, is manifested to the highest degree in 
the life of man. 

Everything in the universe is subject to the 
operation of the eternal and unchanging law of 
God, which regulates every part of the universe 
from center to circumference, from the lowest 
form of life to the highest. The soul and life of 
man are equally under the operation of this law ; 
hence, what we need to know is not more about 
the material world but more about ourselves and 
our relationship to God and to our fellow-men. 

The more we understand, then, of our own 
lives- — the more clearly we can comprehend the 
law and bring our lives into conformity there- 
with — the better results we obtain. Thus may 
we realize the kingdom of heaven here and now. 
At no time has it been discovered in the external 
world, where no one has even found bodily 
health. The outer world is good and useful; 
but it must be a perfect expression of the inner ; 
at best it is only the expression of power, while 
the inner world is power itself Why should we 
seek health and happiness in the mere expression 
of life? Why should we go out of ourselves for 
happiness, or any other good thing ? We must 
begin with the inner life, making the outer life 
secondary, and must work from the cause to the 
effect of things — not from effect to cause. 



Mental Influences 53 

People are continually telling us how they 
are affected by their environment, and by the 
thoughts of others, In truth, no man stands 
alone; yet no one need be subject to the wrong 
thoughts of others. When we have knowledge 
we can no longer excuse ourselves by saying 
that other persons have an ill effect upon us or 
injure us. We have power within to make con- 
ditions what we will to make them. If we will 
to be strong, to be happy, to be well, then let us 
acquire these blessings in the right way. Let us 
seek for happiness and health in the only way 
in which they can be obtained. Let us recog- 
nize this inner part of being — the light that is to 
enlighten every man that cometh into the world. 
Let us realize the God in the being, and work 
from the center outward. 

With knowledge of this inner consciousness 
of life we come in proper touch with every ex- 
ternal thing. We know that all life is one; that 
we are related one to another; that the soul of 
man is one with the great universal soul. This 
realization we manifest in the outer world. In- 
stead of viewing chaos and discord on every 
side, we see a great universe operating in accord 
with eternal law, and destined in every part 
ultimately to reach the fulness of perfection. We 
no longer look upon the world as evil, but see 
in everything the potentiality of good. 



54 ■ The Will to be Well 

Little by little the ideal life is being disclosed; 
our minds, instead of being prone to evil and 
bemoaning the sorrow and misery of the world, 
become filled with joy because we know that all 
things are working from a lower to a higher 
condition. Thus do we turn from the pessi- 
mistic to the optimistic side of life, and become 
useful members of society. 

Sometimes we are inclined to think that 
thought is the very highest function of our 
being. Then we lay great stress on the intel- 
lectual side of thinking, and declare that reason 
is the one supreme fact. But there is something 
more than reason in the life of man — something 
more than thought; there is something that 
produces thought and transcends it. 

Every thought contains a picture. We get 
an idea, a picture, that corresponds to something 
definite in the outer world. So there is an ele- 
ment that brings the thinker in touch with the 
highest. The inner mind is passive. This inner 
presence makes for faith, happiness, and love — 
the qualities of soul that can not be pictured by 
the mind and that alone can fill the life of man. 
These different elements give color and tone to 
every thought, and extend to all external things, 
which thus take on new coloring and new 
beauty. Because of the inner beauty of thought 
we recognize beauty in the outer world; for 






Mental Influences 55 

only what one sees interiorly is visible in the 
external realm, If we have gloom and distress 
in our minds we are related to the gloomy and 
distressful things in the outer world. If we 
have brightness and hope within us, then we 
see these blessings externalized. 

The outer world is a picture of the inner 
world. If our thoughts are neither strong, 
happy, nor wholesome we can not expect to 
express health and strength in the body. It is 
only by entertaining the best and strongest 
thoughts that the inner power of life is ex- 
pressed. 

If we wish to be healthy and to do good in 
the world we will accomplish most by recog- 
nizing the oneness of life — that our finite life is 
a part of the Infinite. As we do good to others 
we do good to ourselves. We can only be 
happy by making others happy. This is what 
Jesus meant when he said, " He that loseth his 
life shall find it." Let us lose it by finding it 
in others, and thereby come into the fulness of 
life. 

Every thought we think has a definite effect 
on the body — it pictures itself there. Life is 
made up of many things. As sorrowful and 
distressing things enter the life, if the mind is 
allowed to dwell on them, the body becomes 
weakened. Dwelling mentally on the bright 



56 The Will to be Well 

and beautiful things that come into the life 
strengthens the body. Everything in this world 
exists for some good reason. Every sad ex- 
perience we pass through teaches a needed 
lesson, which, if we would only learn it, would 
not require distressful repetition. One experi- 
ence follows another, and if we do not heed the 
lesson that each contains for us, it must be re- 
peated till we do. 

There are only two paths in life, and we must 
choose between them. The eternal law is ever 
seeking to bring about perfect expression of life. 
If we understand the law and conform to it, then 
peace and rest result. Oppose the law, and 
purification can come only through bitter ex- 
perience. There is no going back ; there is no 
standing still. 

In the evolution of life we must unfold to that 
which tends toward the perfect likeness of God. 
In some lives this comes gradually, while in 
others the development is more rapid. There is 
no escaping from the purifying process. It may 
come "as by fire," or by obedience to the eternal 
law of God; but in either case "all things are 
working together for good." 

Everything is seeking adjustment. The inner 
adjustment of law is written on the tablet of 
every soul. By "law" I do not mean the law 
of hygiene, or that of physics, or of anything 



Mental Influences 57 

that operates upon the external ; for if the mind 
is right within it will express itself outwardly in 
perfect wholesomeness. It is impossible for a 
man that is clean in mind to be unclean in body. 
It is the inner cleanliness that expresses itself in 
the outer. Our thoughts being right, every 
word and every deed will be so expressed that 
nothing but good will result. 

I am not asking the reader to believe in any 
creed or any dogma. All I claim is that law 
and order regulate life. From their observance 
good results come here and now. From dis- 
obedience comes the reverse. In one case we 
get the good, the strength, the perfection of life; 
in the other we get the pain, the distress, and 
the disease. It is a condition of mind to be 
actualized. Obedience to the inner law will 
bring about a perfect demonstration. If we put 
heaven off for a future realization, it will always 
be postponed. " The kingdom of God is within 
you." We must realize God's kingdom here 
and now. By realizing that inner realm of life 
we will find that the outer expression is good 
and beautiful, and that in so doing we are work- 
ing together for the good of all. 




FREEDOM—INDIVIDUAL AND 
UNIVERSAL 

1 The true secret of freedom, then, is to attune our soul- 
sphere until it beats in rhythmic harmony with universal har- 

mon y-" —"The Light of Egypt." 

"There are two freedoms — the false, where man is free to 
do what he likes ; the true, where man is free to do what he 

oughtl " —Charles Kingsley. 

"Who is the true man? He who does the truth and never 
holds a principle on which he is not prepared in any hour to 
act, and in any hour risk the consequences of holding it. " 

— Carlyle. 

The Nazarene said on one occasion, "Ye shall 
know the truth, and the truth shall make you 
free." When Jesus gave utterance to these 
words he was having a discussion with certain 
ones among the Jews, who referred to Abraham 
as their "father." We find the Jewish people 
everywhere dating their birth from Abraham. 
The Jewish idea was very different from the 
Christ idea: "For One is your Father, which is 
in heaven." And the Hebrews referred their 
religion to "the God of Abraham." With Christ 
it was different, to him there was one great 
Father of all — our Father. 

It has been men's custom throughout all time 

58 



Freedom — Individual and Universal 59 

to quote authorities in defining their position. 
True authority is not to be found outside of 
one's self It is not what some other person, 
however distinguished, may say; it is not what 
any institution or any book may say; it is the 
voice of God speaking to man in his own soul 
that constitutes the ultimate authority of life. 
There is no real authority to be appealed to else- 
where. It is not the acceptance of anything 
from an authority that makes us free; it is the 
Truth that does this. We should seek, there- 
fore, to know all that can be known about truth. 

"What is truth?" asked Pilate. The question 
is always pertinent. While truth is eternally the 
same, man's relation thereto is ever changing. 
Sometimes we live in a valley, wherein the objects 
that surround us seem very large; but when we 
begin to climb the mountain-side they appear to 
grow smaller. As we continue to ascend, our 
view becomes enlarged, but the things in the 
valley have apparently dwindled away. So it is 
in life, wherein one change seems to necessitate 
another. What seems true to us to-day may be 
untrue on the morrow. 

Many people believe that, if they arrive at a 
certain decision, "consistency" requires them 
steadfastly to maintain it. We can only hold to 
a thing until we get something better. When 
something larger comes into the life, the smaller 



6o The Will to be Well 

thing must go out. Yet we find many people 
tenaciously adhering to old things while trying 
to lay hold on the new. They are trying to bal- 
ance themselves between two conditions. They 
declare that, having derived benefit from the old 
in the past, they have no desire to abandon it; 
that, while they may get no good from it now, 
on account of its former usefulness it should not 
be set aside. 

Just so soon as anything becomes an. impedi- 
ment to one's growth the obstacle should be re- 
moved; otherwise there can be no real develop- 
ment. It is only as we die to the things of the 
past and live to the things of the present that we 
enter to any degree into the fulness of life. We 
should not hamper our lives with traditions, but 
rather seek to make a new way for ourselves. 
It will be a living way if we put our real selves 
into it. Whatever we do, it will partake of our 
own life and power. The past may have helped 
us to reach a higher plane of thought and action, 
but if it does not assist us in the present it has 
outlived its usefulness. It can no longer be a 
part of ourselves. 

We wish to adjust ourselves to life in the best 
possible way, and we try to do this with the 
least possible effort — often making serious mis- 
takes. We think that it is our duty to satisfy, in 
some measure, the people of the world about us. 



Freedom — Individual and Universal 61 

But we can not satisfy the world, no matter what 
position we take. Is it not better to live in the 
fulness of individual freedom — in the fulness of 
our own power — than in a way that is apt to 
minify the life? Is it not better to live a great 
life than a little one? Which, think you, would 
eventuate in the ruling of our world? 

Freedom is something that we have the power 
to choose, A man may make his own life free 
if he only will. We may have the full freedom 
of life, but only in one way — through knowledge 
of the truth and conformity thereto. That way 
leads to peace. Coming into this freedom and 
peace, however, we all may sound notes of dis- 
cord; but this seems necessary in the evolution 
of life. We should not be affected by what 
others say or think; yet we should heed the 
voice of God within our souls. If we are obe- 
dient to this, everything good and true will 
come into the life. If we are consciously diso- 
bedient we must accept the consequences of 
such disobedience. That which to a certain 
degree is demanded of one may be required to 
a much greater degree of another. We are all 
in different stages of development; no two have 
developed alike. All any one may be asked to 
do is to live up to his highest knowledge — his 
loftiest ideal of life. If he does this he is free, 
and if he refuses to do it he is in bondage. 



62 The Will to be Well 

Now, on the lower plane — in the valley — 
there are very few requirements; but these 
must be met. The law of that plane must be 
fulfilled. If we view life first from this physical 
plane, and consider its demands — that one must 
be temperate, kind, and considerate, to the ex- 
tent of that plane's possibilities — we shall bring 
about a state of mental poise and physical har- 
mony. But the things required of a person 
living on the next higher plane, where people 
think and reason about life's problems, are more 
varied; there are here more things to think 
about. Such a person has entered into a higher 
knowledge of life, which brings with it added 
responsibilities; and these he can not evade if 
he would be free. Freedom is essential to per- 
fect development. Where there is not freedom 
there is no real growth. Many things are re- 
quired of us on this higher plane — something 
greater than kindness, and something greater 
than temperance, as that term is commonly ap- 
plied. It is the temperance of right thinking; 
i. e. t to think kindly and to form in mind true 
pictures of life. 

When we come to the highest plane of devel- 
opment, the spiritual, we find the requirements 
are vastly greater than those of the other two 
combined. Knowledge of life on the animal and 
mental planes is very partial. But we come to 



Freedom — Individual and Universal 63 

a clearer and higher knowledge in the realm of 
the spirit. We are required to know, first of all, 
in order to be free, that there is but one authority 
in the universe; that is, God, as expressed in the 
life of man. If one would speak out of the ful- 
ness of his own life he must always depend on 
this Authority. On the physical plane authority 
is required. 

There exists in most minds the worship of 
symbols, wherein formal religion got its first 
impetus. On the intellectual plane there is au- 
thority — that of personalities, who formulate 
dogmas for others to believe in. This may be 
legitimate on the purely mental plane, but on 
the spiritual plane there is only one Authority. 
We desire to be free spiritual beings. We wish 
to unfold to all that is in us; but we can not 
unfold to our highest and best if we recognize 
any authority other than that of the divinity 
within. There is where the real freedom of life 
is to be found. 

"But," says some one, "in doing this we will 
have to live in a way entirely different from the 
ways of the world — the ways of others." " If 
any man be in Christ," said one, "he is a new 
creature : old things are passed away." That is 
why all things have become new to the dweller 
on the spiritual plane, and why real authority is 
in man's own life. It is not something apart 



64 The Will to be Well 

from man. So the new creature does not allow 
any other soul to dictate as to what he shall 
think or do. The voice of God in his own soul 
is his only criterion. There is no other source 
of leadership; and when one determines to be 
led by the spirit he comes into the only true 
freedom of life, remaining no longer in bondage 
to the customs and forms of the world, or to his 
own desires. The desire universal comes into 
his mind, and he realizes for the first time that 
he is one with all things, with all power, with all 
intelligence, and with all love and faith and 
hope. His whole life is immersed in this one- 
ness. He no longer leads a personal life, but 
lives universally. 

It is only as we lay hold on the new that we 
come into the fulness of life. Many people look 
upon this as a sacrifice to the world of their 
personal lives; yet it is only apparent at best. 
If in relinquishing one thing we acquire a greater 
thing, there can be no sacrifice. That is some- 
thing that appeals to the mind of the world, not 
to that of the spirit. The spiritual man is above 
all sacrifice. He is superior to the storm and 
the tumult of the world. He is not affected by 
its jealousy, deceit, and hatred. He takes all 
things at their true valuation. 

Is it not reassuring to feel that we have God 
working within us to will and to do, and that 



Freedom — Individual and Universal 65 

we are equal to any emergency that may pre- 
sent itself in our daily lives because of this inner 
power? We place everything in God's care 
when we acknowledge God in the life and choose 
to follow the dictates of our own conscience. 
This is the one essential thing. We can never 
satisfy the world, no matter how hard we try 
to conform to its opinions. When one sees 
that the task is a hopeless one, what is the use 
of continuing the effort? 

Let us conform to the best that is in our own 
lives, and we will soon realize that our influence 
for good will be far greater than any influence 
we might bring to bear when we try to adjust 
our condition of life to the standards of others. 
Man makes his outer world what he chooses to 
make it. We may consciously and actually 
make this world just as bright and beautiful a 
world as we wish to make it; but we can not 
serve God and also serve the world. " Where 
your treasure is, there will your heart be also." 
If we desire to be Godlike, and to express out- 
wardly all that we are inwardly, we must 
acknowledge the power of God in the individual 
life by co-operating with the divine process — by 
consciously working out the God-plan of life 
and so placing ourselves in at-one-ment there- 
with that we may apprehend the result as we 
proceed. 



66 The Will to be Well 

At this point the element of faith comes in. 
Faith is the ground- work of such knowledge; 
but we must ever work with one object in view 
— to know the truth, and, through knowing it, 
to be free. Sometimes, however, we know the 
truth and yet are in bondage. Only as we are 
the truth — become one with it — can there be 
any real freedom. 

In all our spiritual aspirations there will be a 
thoroughly harmonious breath-action, whereby, 
starting from the center of life, we may produce 
true vibration in both mind and body; but this 
harmony does not end here. 

We look at a rose ; it is a beautiful thing. It 
occupies very little space, but on entering the 
room that contains it we smell its perfume 
everywhere. We sense the soul of the rose, just 
as, through knowledge of the spiritual life, we 
apprehend God in our lives. We may exhale 
a fragrance more sweet than any rose. Some- 
times a weed diffuses a disagreeable odor, and 
so from many human lives there emanates a 
deleterious influence that is equally subtle. It is 
because in many cases the individual knows, but 
fails to act — fails to be; and thus produces a 
wrong vibration, which disturbs his own mind 
and body and communicates inharmony to 
others. It is true that some persons have the 
power to smell the most delicate perfume while 



Freedom — Individual and Universal 6y 

being unable to smell the most disagreeable 
odors. This is because they have related them-* 
selves to their environment in the true way. 
To them, all agreeable things will attract, while 
disagreeable things will repel. It all hinges on 
the question of relationship. 

Some think this philosophy has a selfish 
aspect ; but is it not right to desire the beautiful 
things in life ? Every individual is doing more 
than living his own life ; he is living for others 
as well. If he can show a way to live other 
than the ordinary way he should do so. If he 
can rise* superior to the discordant things of the 
world he is not true to himself or to his fellow- 
man if he fails to do so. We can make our lives 
just what we will to make them, and by so doing 
we bring wider knowledge and greater freedom 
into the world — because " no man liveth to him- 
self, and no man dieth to himself." If we are 
living as we should live, we affect the lives of 
others by bringing new life to them. If we are 
living in a condition of passive contentment, and 
our minds are absorbed in things that bring no 
spiritual gain, we will neither bring good into 
the lives of others nor develop that quality in 
ourselves. If we could realize the importance 
of this we would never radiate any inharmonious 
atmosphere. We would begin at the very heart 
of life and work toward the circumference, and 



68 The Will to be Well 

we would affect those about us in a thoroughly 
harmonious way. 

Through accepting the guidance of the higher 
impulses, we think rightly through right feeling 
and breathe rightly through right feeling and 
thinking. We can not shape our lives from any 
outer model. It is the creative power within 
that makes all changes, even in the things 
about us. 

Persons not satisfied with the present order 
seek to reform it. The first step in any reforma- 
tion is to conform to this inner law. We should 
strive to change the outer through the inner. 
Thus do we become thoroughly harmonious in 
mind and body and avoid being led into bond- 
age of any kind. We wish to be free in the 
Christ — the Christ thought and order of life; 
for there is a Christ order, which frees us from 
all the sin, sickness, and slavery of the world. 
Obedience thereto enables us to rise above the 
world and its limitations and to become a law 
unto ourselves — a law that brings only that which 
is true and good and pure into the mind. If we 
would avail ourselves of its beneficence we must 
acknowledge its spiritual operation in our indi- 
vidual lives. Thus shall we realize that we are 
children of God and joint heirs with Christ, and 
that we have dominion and power over all things. 



HEARING AND DOING 

M Our thoughts are the text; our lives preach the sermon." 

" Let what is natural in you raise itself to the level of the 
spiritual, and let the spiritual become once more natural. 
Thus will your development be harmonious, and the peace of 
heaven will shine upon your brow — always on condition that 
your peace is made, and that you have climbed your Calvary." 

— "Amiel's Journal." 

"Our own spirit is the vestibule which we must enter, as 
threshold to the temple of the eternal, and wherein alone we 
can catch any whisper from the holy of holies." 

— James Martineau. 

Some college professors admitted to me some 
time ago that the world is turning more and 
more toward the search after health along 
mental or psychical lines, conceding that the 
more advanced students believe not only that 
health is obtainable through mental effort alone, 
but that the time is near when great numbers of 
people will so seek thus to regulate their lives 
that human life shall be greatly prolonged. It 
is true beyond doubt that scientific minds are 
investigating this subject to-day as never before. 
Medical men may strive to side-track the issue 
by appealing to hypnotism or some other agency, 
but they are not succeeding to any marked 
degree. 

69 



7 o 



The Will to be Well 



The doctors make strenuous efforts to pro- 
cure legislation prohibiting the practice of Men- 
tal and Christian Science, ostensibly because 
these schools are inimical to the public welfare, 
but really because they tend to reduce medical 
incomes. Yet intelligent physicians everywhere 
are dispensing more and more with the use of 
drugs, and are confining themselves to the 
giving of advice as to diet and the making of 
hygienic suggestions. 

My object in referring to this is to show that 
progress in the spiritual and psychic realms is 
undoubtedly being made; yet a still more en- 
couraging fact is that very many people who 
formerly took regular mental treatment are now 
beginning to rely largely on their own efforts to 
keep well. This is as it should be, because we 
have a right to regulate our own health. We 
all have the power, but unfortunately we do not 
always use it intelligently. In order to control 
and direct the power of life, we must focus our 
attention upon it in the natural way, and not 
imagine that, if ill, five or ten minutes' effort will 
make us well and strong. The age of miracles 
has not yet arrived. 

Let us see how intelligence may be brought 
to bear on the different phases of this subject. 
In the first place, let us consider the morbid, or 
diseased, side of human life, in order to discover 



Hearing and Doing 71 

how we get into wrong conditions — because if 
we know this we may also learn how to get out 
of them : by retracing our steps. 

The very best scientists in the world to-day 
no longer regard the brain as the generator of 
thought, but rather as an instrument through 
which thought acts. They recognize that 
thought is independent of the brain, though it 
acts upon it. The entire physical body is only 
one of our possessions, and is not by any means 
our greatest possession. We have the right to 
do with it as we will, so long as our authority is 
exercised in accord with law ; that is, so long as 
the will is used to produce a harmonious effect 
upon the body, because if used otherwise the 
will is bound more or less to injure this house 
we live in. 

A great many people suppose they are think- 
ing when they are really doing nothing of the 
kind, but are using their brains to such a degree 
that an undue amount of blood is drawn to the 
head, where, becoming congested, it accelerates 
the vibrations of the upper portion of the body 
till the head is very hot and the feet are very 
cold. The physical effect produced here is the re- 
sult of wrong thinking, not right thinking, which 
has never yet caused a congestion of any kind. 
Right thought can not produce a rapidity of 
vibration that will result in an overheated head. 






72 The Will to be Well 

When we refer to certain persons as being 
"hot-headed," we mean that they become angry 
easily, for anger is an emotion that drives the 
blood unduly to the brain. There is a very del- 
icate part of the body called the mucous mem- 
brane, and when the rate of vibration is thus in- 
creased it becomes inflamed, the result being 
what is known as a "catarrhal" condition. Again, 
we are very sensitive as to what people say or 
think of us, and are frequently so affected by 
their words or thoughts that this membrane be- 
comes similarly inflamed; moreover, we have a 
disturbance of the stomach, and we say it results 
from something we have eaten or drunk — but it 
means simply that we have allowed ourselves to 
be annoyed by what some one else has said or 
thought. 

No one can produce in us a wrong method of 
thinking unless we allow him to do it. Let us 
cease trying to shift the responsibility from our 
own shoulders on to those of some one else by 
insisting that another's failure to do this or that 
has caused our suffering; for it is a very poor 
excuse. We suffer for our own misdeeds, and 
when we lend ourselves to the sinful side of life 
we have a right to expect no other result. It 
rests with each individual whether he shall be 
related to the world about him in a strong- and 
healthy way or in a weak and diseased way. 



Hearing and Doing 73 

It is better to know the truth about these 
things — to face the whole truth — than to go on 
year after year laying the responsibility for our 
mental and physical conditions at the doors of 
other people or other things, when we ourselves 
are solely responsible. It is not enough to say 
that we are "negative" and that we "take on 
conditions " from others. If we are negative it 
is because we have allowed ourselves to become 
so without reason. If wrong thought reaches 
us from other people it is because we open wide 
our door and tacitly invite it to enter. We liter- 
ally call out what others say or think of us. 
There is something within us that, coming in 
touch with the identical quality in other people, 
stirs it into activity. When this result does not 
follow, it means that we have risen above it. 
If it seems to come and has no effect upon us, 
we have proof that we are not one with it ; that 
is, that we have no fondness for it. We do not 
like to have unkind things said of us by others ; 
yet if we ourselves say unkind things we become 
one with that habit of thought and thus call 
forth just such remarks, which adversely affect 
us mentally and therefore physically. 

We become one with whatever we love. We 
become intimately related also to those about 
whom we say unkind things — to the unkind 
thought of the world ; the converse of this prop- 



74 The Will to be Well 

osition being equally true. If we love to say and 
do kind things, we are one with the good deeds 
and the good people of the world. 

And so it is with health, with wholeness ; for 
health and wholeness, harmony and heaven, 
mean virtually the same thing. When a person 
is healthy he is harmonious. How many har- 
monious people are there in this world — people 
who can say that they are well in every part of 
their being — perfectly whole and perfectly har- 
monious in both mind and body? This is a 
question that I feel we all should ask ourselves. 
If we are not in full enjoyment of this state, it is 
time for us to begin to think about heaven right 
here and now — about health and harmony at 
the present time. What is the use in dragging 
out a miserable existence? If we are not har- 
monious in our own minds, and if our bodies 
are ill, where shall we find the happiness of life? 
We create our own heaven and are the authors 
of our own health. The power is Godgiven. 

It is right that each and every individual 
should present his body whole and acceptable 
unto God, for this is his reasonable service. He 
should present a body whole to that higher part 
of his being which is the God part, so that this 
inner harmony may have its reflection in outer 
harmony — that the soul at peace and rest may 
show itself forth in peace and rest of mind and 



Hearing and Doing 75 

body. If we are not doing this we are not liv- 
ing up to our highest knowledge of life. It is 
done by creating the desire first in mind, every 
wholesome thought leading to a mental con- 
dition in which we love to talk about health and 
strength and harmony in preference to sickness 
and disease and other disagreeable things. Thus 
do we become one with the healthy-minded, who 
show forth health in their bodies ; but it must be 
accomplished by each individual for himself. 

No mental healer is able to do more than to 
help his patient on to the true path, whereon he 
must walk unaided. Very often I have met people 
who had taken mental treatment and who for years 
had made splendid progress; yet a time came 
when the treatment seemed to have no beneficial 
effect. Why was this ? The reason is plain. 

When a person comes to take treatment new 
desires and new impulses fill his mind and soul; 
but he does not always act upon them. Some, 
sooner or later, actually die to all knowledge of 
them. All mental and spiritual treatment has 
for its object the helping of people to help them- 
selves, and if they refuse they must take the 
responsibility for whatever trouble may ensue. 
" For whosoever hath," said Jesus, "to him shall 
be given; but whosoever hath not, from him 
shall be taken away even that he hath." If we ^ 
have desire for a better and a stronger life, but 



76 The Will to be Well 

make no effort to manifest or realize it, even 
that which we have shall be taken away. Hence 
do we find some who no longer derive benefit 
from treatment. The regaining of their health 
must come through knowledge of those obliga- 
tions which they themselves assumed in the past. 

There are people who go about with weak 
and diseased bodies, finding fault with every- 
thing and everybody with whom they come in 
contact. There is no New Thought about this 
course of procedure: it is the very oldest kind 
of thought. No true mental scientist takes that 
attitude toward anything. A true mental scien- 
tist is one who understands the principles and 
applies them. He may go to a metaphysical 
meeting every night, but if he fails to act upon 
the theories expounded he is not a mental scien- 
tist but a common "follower" of the New 
Thought; and, instead of being a help, he may 
become a hindrance more deterrent than an 
open enemy of the cause. 

If we desire to be one with the New Thought 
we must accomplish this through our love for 
its teachings. Instead of wasting so much time 
in thinking of our own welfare, let us think of 
the welfare of others. The mind that is centered 
on thoughts of the personal good to be got out 
of life is sure to get the least good out of it. 
It is the one who in the right way thinks and 



Hearing a?id Doing 77 

cares for others that is going to get the most 
good. It is not our duty to carry others through 
life or to work out their salvation for them, but 
to show them the right way — to make their lives 
a little easier, a little happier and a little better. 

If we are to become true followers of the New 
Thought movement, it is not enough to listen to 
some teacher for an hour or two, and then go 
away and think and talk about something else. 
This is not an act of love. It may make us feel 
good for the time being, but we are storing up 
for ourselves judgment; for with knowledge 
comes responsibility. If we are learning how to 
live and do not act upon our knowledge, we are 
simply storing up future troubles. 

I think perhaps one of the most discouraging 
things that come into the life of the New 
Thought teacher is not that people neglect to 
come, because an attendance may be secured 
anywhere; not that people do not listen atten- 
tively, because they do, and then often go away 
and omit to act upon the knowledge they have 
acquired; but to see certain ones come year 
after year and listen to lectures, all the time car- 
rying about with them the elements of mental 
or physical weakness. One is inclined to ask 
himself whether preaching after all is not in vain. 

Each soul is a thought of God, and each 
thought is perfect; but are we giving due ex- 



78 The Will to be Well 

pression to it — are we properly working out 
that which God has inwrought ? Are we using 
God's gifts and developing our God-given qual- 
ities ? Thus only can we fulfil the perfect law. 
We can not with impunity continue to listen and 
learn and then deliberately disobey, day after 
day, week after week, month after month, and 
year after year, the law of God as it is made 
clear to us. The way of life is not difficult. 
The way of health, strength, and happiness is 
not hard ; it is, however, one that each individual 
must choose and tread for himself. 

Whatever we see that is beautiful in this 
world, and whatever the heart desires — whatever 
is true, pure, and upright — let us become one 
with it by trying to be it and to love it. There is 
no other way. We can be what we will to be, 
but we must will it with both mind and heart. 
When we think and also feel we become one 
with the object of our attention. If our thought 
goes out to the good, the true, and the whole- 
some, we manifest these qualities in our lives; 
and if our thought goes out in divine love, we 
become one with eternal Love. If our thought 
goes out in loving-kindness toward all people, 
we become one with them. When the mind 
dwells on what the heart feels, we become one 
with that on which it dwells. 



THE MISSION OF JESUS 

* ' Worship's deeper meaning lies 
In mercy, and not sacrifice. 
Not proud humilities of sense 
And posturing of penitence, 
But love's unforced obedience; 
******* 

Christ dwells not afar, 
******* 
But here, amidst the poor and blind, 
The bound and suffering of our kind; 
In works we do, in prayers we pray, 
Life of our life, he lives to-day." 

— Whittikr. 

On a Sabbath day, nearly nineteen hundred 
years ago, in the city of Nazareth, a man, 
coarsely attired even for those days, was seen to 
enter the synagogue. Having inquired of an 
attendant, a book was handed to him, which 
he opened and read from the prophet Esaias : 
"The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because He 
hath anointed me to preach the gospel to the 
poor; He hath sent me to heal the broken-hearted, 
to preach deliverance to the captives, and re- 
covering of sight to the blind, to set at liberty 
them that are bruised, to preach the acceptable 
year of the Lord." Having read this, he closed 
the book and returned it to the minister. Then 

79 



So The Will to be Well 

addressing the people, he said, " This day is this 
scripture fulfilled in your ears." 

Now, although many centuries have elapsed 
since that event, every civilized person living 
to-day knows who that man was. It is not the 
man Jesus, but his mission, that we are inter- 
ested in — a mission that has been wofully mis- 
understood in the past. Who is better able to 
tell what that mission was than Jesus, who was 
"anointed of God" and filled with the very 
spirit of truth? Surely he, if any one, should 
be able to tell; and in the passage quoted he 
does tell in a few words, and in no uncertain 
way. His whole work is here made clear. He 
does not say that he came to found a new 
religion, or to promulgate a new creed or a new 
doctrine. No doubt he thought that the people 
of that time had enough of that sort of thing, as 
we have now. 

Part of the mission of Jesus was to preach the 
gospel to the poor. Strictly speaking this may 
not mean those poor in wordly goods, but all 
those who feel their own unworthiness and who 
have a desire to attain to higher things. We 
might say those that are poor in spirit — hungry 
and thirsty for spiritual nourishment: to such 
Jesus was going to preach the gospel of Light 
and Truth. 

u He hath sent me to heal the broken-hearted." 



The Mission of Jesus 81 

Truly, his mission was a blessed one — one that 
looms far above any whose aim is merely to 
give a new religion or an ethical code to the 
world. "To heal the broken-hearted" How deep 
these words sink into the soul ! Is it any wonder 
we cherish his utterances and his deeds when we 
see what loving compassion he entertained for 
all the wretched and sorrowing? The broken- 
hearted have found and will ever find comfort in 
his words and example. 

But this does not mean that they must wor- 
ship at the throne of personality. Jesus was so 
permeated by the spirit of love that it completely 
overshadowed the mere personality ; and that is 
why he spoke as never man spake. " I speak 
not of myself," he says; "but the Father that 
dwelleth in me, He doeth the works." 

It is not the spiritual part of our being that 
tells us we are other than sons of God: it is the 
blind worship of personality and form. It is 
just as necessary and expedient for us to discard 
the personal way of viewing the Christ as it was 
for the disciples of Jesus. The theological mis- 
conceptions concerning the life and mission of 
the "lowly Nazarene" arise from the stress laid 
upon the personal man and the lack of knowl- 
edge concerning the spirit that animated and 
controlled him. There is no ground whatever 
for believing that the personality of Jesus differed 



82 The Will to be Well 

from that of other men. He himself made far 
less of that personality than we do of ours; for, 
as we see, he gives all honor and glory to the 
spirit of God. In this worship of personality 
we belittle the God we seek to worship and 
make ineffective the teachings of Jesus. We 
never find him declaring that God is a person- 
ality; but we hear him proclaiming that God is 
Spirit, and must be worshiped in spirit. 

Besides healing the broken-hearted, Jesus was 
to set "the captives" free. Who were those 
that he was to be instrumental in freeing? Com- 
ing down to our own age, we find the same kind 
of captives that existed in his day. Riches, 
worldly honors, ambition to excel, desire to 
obtain the plaudits of men — these carry many 
captives. Jesus would release the men that 
sought after riches by pointing to the king- 
dom within. This would bring more abundant 
riches, which could not take wings and fly away 
but which would last eternally. He would 
show those seeking after worldly honors that 
they were but chasing a fleeting shadow that 
could in no way bring them permanent gain — 
that honors conferred on them from "on high" 
were the only lasting and true ones; and that 
the one seeking the plaudits of men would find 
after all that it was but vanity, and that the 
approval of God was far more to be desired. 



The Mission of Jesus 8$ 

Thus we find, by both word and example, he 
set the captives free. 

The restoring of sight to the blind was also a 
part of the mission of Jesus. The people sat in 
darkness — in the region and shadow of death. 
But he brought a light that dispelled the clouds; 
the eyes that had so long been blinded from 
looking into the shadows and darkness were yet 
to see. Spiritual sight was never given to man 
to peer into the shadows and darkness, but that 
he might look up to the very heights whence 
cometh salvation. Looking heavenward, men 
lose sight of the unreal; death is not even a 
shadow. They see and know nothing save the 
great realities — Life, Love, and Truth — which 
are in all and are all 

Men have ever seemed more prone to dwell 
in the darkness than in the light. Shadow has 
seemed to contain more than substance, and 
thus they become blinded ; for while in this state, 
they have no need of sight. So Jesus came to 
show that, even though they were blind, their 
eyes might yet be opened — the sight that had 
been dimmed might yet see clearly. 

And he " set at liberty" the " bruised." Who 
were they? The people going to the temples 
and the synagogues asking for bread, while the 
priests and Levites were giving them stones — 
feeding them on that which could never satisfy 



84 The Will to be Well 

the hungry soul. The soul can never be con- 
tent with the things of this world. Creed, form, 
and ostentation may satisfy the outer man, but 
never the inner. These things but bruise and 
torment ; and the man or woman that is in any 
way bound to them will be bruised — is captive 
in the fullest sense of the word. The captivity 
and the bruising will continue until the spirit of 
truth sets the weary ones free. The Truth alone 
can make us free; therefore, until people see 
spiritually they will be bruised. 

Everything transpiring in the world about us 
is but a type of things occurring in the invisible 
world of thoughts and ideas. The outer form, 
or symbol, is nothing more than the manifesta- 
tion of these thoughts and ideas. Everything 
expressed in the visible world has its ideal, or 
counterpart, in the invisible. If we can see no 
further than the form of things, how is it possi- 
ble for us to arrive at the true solution of any 
of the great problems that confront us? If we 
view the birth, crucifixion, and resurrection of 
Jesus from an external or literal point of view, 
in what way is it going to profit us ? 

Let no false views cloud the mind. It is not 
what we believe concerning what we see dis- 
closed in the letter that saves us. By submit- 
ting our finite wills to the divine will — by under- 
standing our relation to the Source of all life — 



The Mission of Jesus 85 

life and immortality are disclosed to our view. 
Let us not deceive ourselves with the vain belief 
that through what we term intellect we are able 
to fathom and understand the spiritual truths of 
our being. The spirit of God must first quicken 
the understanding before these things can be 
made plain. The interpretation of spiritual things 
must come through spiritual channels before we 
can truly and clearly see. 

Still another thing Jesus was to do: "to 
preach the acceptable year of the Lord." That 
is, to show the people that God was not to be 
sought after at certain times or seasons, but 
that now is the day of salvation ; that they need 
not wait seven years before the year of rest 
should come. 

To preach the gospel to the poor ; to heal the 
broken-hearted; to preach deliverance to the 
captives and recovering of sight to the blind; 
to set at liberty them that are bruised ; to pro- 
claim the acceptable year of the Lord: this, 
then, is the sum and substance of the mission of 
Jesus. 

Some would add a great many things that 
Jesus never taught. They would have us fall 
down and worship the man; they would have 
us believe that it is through the shedding of 
his material blood that we are saved. Now, 
let us understand this word shedding aright. 



86 The Will to be Well 

The shedding of his blood was the casting off of 
the old nature — of something no longer useful. 
This is the true meaning. It is the new life that 
is disclosed. It is this passage from death unto 
life that should bring joy and peace into our 
lives; because we know that, if one soul has 
died to a knowledge of earthly things and lived 
to a knowledge of heavenly things, then that 
which has come to pass in the development of 
that soul, according to the eternal and unchang- 
ing law of God, must come to pass in the devel- 
opment of all souls. 

This is the great and glorious hope that 
should thrill the breast of all mankind: that 
through man came the resurrection from the 
dead. Man died when his personal will asserted 
its supremacy — when he was guided by his 
lower instincts and animal propensities ; and 
man arose from the dead when he cast off these 
things and acknowledged the will of God as 
being the supreme and only will that he should 
recognize or obey. 

So it is written that the first Adam was made 
a living soul, but the last Adam was made a 
quickening spirit. Thus we see how vain is the 
Lelief that the shedding of the material blood of 
Jesus can advance us spiritually. Vain indeed 
are the commandments of men concerning this. 
The Christ within alone can save — can set us 



The Mission of Jesus 87 

free. Jesus of Nazareth points out the way — 
he preaches the gospel of deliverance; but 
within is the deliverer that can enlighten every 
man that cometh into the world. The heir of 
God, the joint heir with Christ, the son of God, 
is to be found within our own souls. The I Am 
— the God in the soul of man — is the resurrec- 
tion and the life eternal. 

There are other men that would take away 
from this mission of Jesus. They try to show 
that he was a fanatic, a disturber of the peace; 
that his teachings are contrary to common sense 
— as these men view common sense. With this 
class it is hard to have patience. 

We all know that God has a mission for 
every soul to perform. My brother or my sister, 
have you truly found out what that mission is ? 
Are you living for self, or are you advancing 
heavenward by living and doing for others? Is 
your mission to heal the sick, to preach de- 
liverance to the captives, to proclaim the accept- 
able year of the Lord? Whatever it is, throw 
your whole soul into it. Do not go about it in a 
half-hearted way. Make every thought, word, 
and deed count. What the world needs to-day 
is practical, not theoretical, Christianity. The 
world is weary of the theoretical that is never 
put into action. Theories may be grand and 
true; but of what avail are they when not put to 



88 The Will to be Well 

practical use? Would the teachings of Jesus 
have made a lasting impression on the world 
if he had failed in any way to live as he 
taught? 

We find people to-day that talk with reverence 
of the Sermon on the Mount and the good it 
has accomplished. Yet they are very far from 
adapting or applying the great principles con- 
tained therein. In reality the Sermon might as 
well never have been spoken, so far as they are 
concerned ; for they do not receive any real or 
lasting good from it. 

Of what use are all the philosophies and re- 
ligions of the world if not put into practical use ? 
"Be not deceived; God is not mocked." We 
may deceive men with our outward professions 
of religion; we may observe every rite and 
form ; we may talk like angels of light; but God 
knows the thoughts and intents of the heart. 
He judges our every thought; to Him we all 
render our account ; and we shall find that mere 
pretension is a coin not current in God's realm. 
How can we expect to reap where we have not 
sown? 

It is unmistakably true tnat we, each and all, 
have a mission; and no matter whether it be 
high or low, in the eyes of the world, we know 
that with God there is neither high nor low. 
God requires only that each shall carry on his 






The Mission of Jesus 



8 9 



mission in this world according to his degree of 
spiritual unfoldment; and having done this faith- 
fully, the "still, small voice," speaking from 
within, says: "Well done, good and faithful 
servant, enter thou into the joy of thy lord." 




THE RELIGION OF CHRIST 

44 So then because thou art lukewarm, and neither cold nor 
hot, I will spue thee out of my mouth." R£y »j jg 

44 Awake thou that sleepest, and arise from the dead, and 
Christ shall give thee light." £ pH y -^ 

The reign of dogmatic, theological Christian- 
ity is passing away. It has had its day — proba- 
bly, also, its use — and people are no longer 
attracted to it by the inducements held out in 
the shape of a future reward to those complying 
with its requirements. Neither do they fear its 
anathemas — the "future punishment" awaiting 
those who go contrary to its teachings. It is 
thus robbed of its greatest two agencies for per- 
petuating its influence and power. 

But there are certain other things that will 
continue to have some effect in holding the 
ecclesiastical organism together. Chief among 
these is the force of custom. People get into 
the habit of doing certain things, and it soon 
becomes easier to do them than not to do them. 
Thus a large number of people find their way to 
church from force of habit. It is the conven- 
tional thing to do — the Church is eminently re- 
spectable. 



The Religion of Christ 91 

Of themselves, however, these things can not 
indefinitely hold the institution intact. A promi- 
nent clergyman once said to me: " Spirituality 
is dead in the Church." Another of equal emi- 
nence said: "The longer I live the less plan can 
I see in creation; every year I become more 
pessimistic." And a leading New York minister 
recently remarked that "sectarianism has utterly 
failed, and infidelity is rampant in the land." I 
quote these sayings merely to show that there is 
a decided feeling of apprehension within the 
Church in regard to its own usefulness and 
future maintenance. 

Costly edifices continue to be erected, but they 
are designed as churches for the few, not the 
many. Church attendance is steadily falling off, 
year by year ; yet here and there will be found 
a church at which the attendance is large. 
Sometimes the reason for this exceptional suc- 
cess is the spiritual development of the minister, 
who, recognizing the needs of his congregation, 
honestly strives to do all in his power to assist 
them. As a rule, however, the full churches are 
the direct result of a certain kind of sensational 
preaching that has come in vogue in the last 
two decades. It assails individuals and parties, 
and is largely made up of denunciation and in- 
vective. Such preaching engenders anger and 
strife, but very little of the love of Christ; yet it 



g2 The Will to be Well 

undoubtedly proves attractive to a certain class 
of people. 

Money continues to flow into the church 
coffers in great abundance; but money alone 
can not accomplish everything, and thus far it 
has failed to keep the pews filled. It may be 
that the Church has devoted so much effort to 
Christianizing the "benighted heathen" that it 
has become lax in its home endeavors. It would 
almost appear, on the face of things, as if the 
"heathen" were making more converts in our 
own domain than the Church is making in 
pagan lands. Not that / look upon the many 
teachers that come to us from foreign countries 
as u heathen," but this is certainly the Church 
view. 

Looking over, then, the past and the present 
of Christianity, as taught by the Church, the 
conclusion is inevitable that, no matter what its 
past record may have been, it is ineffectual in its 
efforts of the present. We are thus led to ask 
ourselves, Is Christianity a failure? If viewed 
from the dogmatic, theological standpoint, it is 
not only a failure but a colossal one, in that it has 
perverted the very teachings of its Founder. 

If we turn to Luke iv. 17-20, we will find 
what Jesus declared his true mission to be. It 
was certainly not to construct a vast ecclesias- 
tical system. His gospel was to be one of 



The Religion of Christ 93 

spiritual enlightenment — for the healing of per- 
sons that were diseased in either mind or body. 
There was no article of belief nor complex 
creed. In fact, the great requirement to fit a 
man for this world or for any other was love 
and service to God through love and service to 
man. Christ's idea of God was an all-loving 
Father, who dwelt in the hearts of His children 
and would direct their ways aright; that His 
loving presence in the life of man caused the 
healing of both mind and body; that He was 
likewise an all-merciful Father, caring for all 
His children and sending both rain and sun- 
shine on good and bad alike; that He was kind 
to the unthankful and the evil, and that His 
love passed all human understanding. 

Theological perversion of these great truths 
has taken the life out of Christianity and well- 
nigh destroyed its usefulness. What the world 
needs to-day is an aggressive, optimistic, gen- 
uinely Christian religion: aggressive in the 
sense that it stands for the great fundamental 
truths of Being, and optimistic in that it pro- 
claims a gospel of glad tidings, a gospel of 
peace and good-will to all, a gospel that not 
only heals the mind but gives health and 
strength to the body, thus showing a present, 
not a deferred, salvation — one that, moreover, 
does not exempt the body of man. Such a re- 



94 The Will to be Well 

ligion would kindle anew the spirit of true 
Christianity, and its influence would be felt in 
every part of the world. The pessimism of the 
age would dissolve before its progress, as the 
early morning mist before the rising sun. 

Pessimism has no real abiding place in the 
minds of the people. It has been fostered by 
the lack of spirituality in the Church and the 
materialistic tendencies of the age. It is made 
up rather of the things men " don't know " than 
of what they do know. 

It may be claimed by pessimists that they 
have as much ground for their lack of faith as 
the optimist has for his sufficiency; but this is a 
fallacy that can be easily exposed. Pessimism 
gives rise to gloom and despondency of mind, 
and indigestion and biliousness of body; while 
the bright, cheerful person that sees good in all 
things takes the most hopeful, optimistic view of 
life, and the body is strengthened and nourished 
— the man himself gaining much more of pres- 
ent happiness. Leaving, then, all question of 
future good out of consideration, the optimist, 
with his faith centered in the love of good, is 
infinitely better off than the one lacking in such 
faith. 

Let this optimistic Christ-religion show man 
that God does not afflict him, but that all the 
evils of human life are occasioned by his own 



The Religion of Christ 95 

wrong-doing; that thought, whether it be true 
or false, must affect the life either for good or 
ill; that it is only as men come to a knowledge 
of their own powers and possibilities, properly- 
using the talents wherewith they are endowed, 
that the health and happiness of life become 
abiding states; that lack of knowledge is at the 
bottom of all their woe; that, while they them- 
selves have wrongly conditioned their lives, 
they have the inherent power to create new con- 
ditions; that real Christianity is living the life; 
that a belief or a faith that finds no expression 
in works is of no avail; and that, while the 
works are not to be regarded as of the greatest 
importance, yet they are the natural outcome of 
a living faith. 

Above all, let this renewed and quickened 
Christianity stand for the omnipotence, the 
omniscience, and the omnipresence of God. 
Let it teach that all life is of the One Life; that 
the Power is both within and without; that all 
visible things are the expression of the power of 
God; that man has no existence apart from the 
One Life ; that in God he lives and moves and 
has his being; that all intelligence is One Intel- 
ligence, entering into, controlling, and directing 
all things ; that each soul is one with the great 
creative Spirit, drawing its life, its love, and its 
wisdom from an eternal Fount; and that man is 



96 The Will to be Well 

related to God as a child to his parents; there- 
fore, that all men are brothers. 

People are hungering and thirsting for a faith 
that, ignoring non-essentials, goes directly to 
the heart of things : one that, ignoring outward 
works, has its inception in the life. The chief 
obstacles in their path are the dogmatic creed 
and the sectarian spirit, as put forward by the 
alleged "spiritual" teachers of the people. Let 
not these leaders bewail the fact that " infidelity 
is rampant in the land," or that the power of evil 
seems greater than that of the good; rather let 
them reverse their methods by putting aside the 
old things that have hampered their progress. 
Let them stand for a vital Christianity — one that 
will appeal to the very soul of man and show 
that real Christianity is practised by leading the 
Christ life; that the different bodies composing 
the Christian Church, instead of fighting one 
another, should endeavor, so far as possible, to 
find points of agreement in their respective sys- 
tems. Let the Church stand fairly and squarely 
on the great Christian law, as put forward by 
Jesus — the non-resistance of evil, or the over- 
coming of evil with good — instead of fighting 
windmills. 

Truth is ever powerful. It alone overcomes 
evil and the darkness of the world. The Church 
that would abide must stand on the eternal 



The Religion of Christ 97 

foundation of an omnipotent, omniscient, and 
omnipresent God, with all that these adjectives 
imply, knowing that everything contradicting 
this position is only the vain imagination that 
exalts itself over and against a knowledge of 
good. Let the Church follow this course; let 
it make a new statement of the vital truths of 
the Christian religion ; let it burn away the straw 
and stubble of the past and build on a new 
foundation, and there will be a new awakening 
such as the world has never seen. The churches, 
instead of being empty, will be filled to over- 
flowing, because people are hungering and 
thirsting as never before for something to come 
into their lives that will bring peace and rest in 
its train. 

The Christ-gospel is a gospel of peace: a 
gospel that brings rest to the soul — that brings 
life and immortality to light The Church has 
all the physical equipment necessary for its prop- 
aganda; but in one thing it is lacking — spiritu- 
ality. Will it forget the world, and the things 
of the world, and seek after God? If it should, 
it has a future far greater than its past. Let it 
continue in the old ruts, preaching the dead 
doctrine, and the paralysis that year by year has 
been creeping steadily through its organism will 
become total, and, as with other human institu- 
tions, its day will soon be gone and its useful- 



98 The Will to be Well 

ness ended forever. It is now at its most crucial 
turning-point. It can no longer serve two mas- 
ters. It must choose between the spirit of God 
and the spirit of the world. It must stand for 
something or for nothing. 

In conclusion, I wish to say that this article 
has not been written in any spirit of fault-finding. 
In the writer's mind there is no thought of 
antagonism nor uncharitableness, but only a 
sincere desire that the leaders of the Church 
may be quick to apprehend the danger that evi- 
dently awaits it. It is menaced, not by any evil 
coming upon the institution from without — from 
people opposed to its teachings — but by a lack 
of vital force and power within — the need of 
greater Christian charity, more unity of thought 
and action, and the all-essential feeling of Chris- 
tian love both for those within and for those 
without the fold. My earnest prayer is that the 
religious leaders of the day may realize this 
urgent need, and strive in every way to supply 
it — that the Christ-Church may reign trium- 
phant in the hearts and minds of the people. 




THINGS WORTH REMEMBERING 

" Man is permitted much 
To scan and learn 
In Nature's frame; 
Till he well-nigh can tame 
Brute mischiefs, and can touch 
Invisible things, and turn 
All warring ills to purposes of good. 
******* 

He can controul 
And harmonize what seems amiss to flow." 

— John Henry Newj*an. ii8oi,) 

We are surrounded by mystery; yet we pay 
but little attention either to the mystery of form 
in the outer world or to the mystery of life in 
the inner. Our attention' is directed only to 
those things that, because they are of uncom- 
mon occurrence, we believe to be remarkable. 
There is a love of the mysterious in man; yet he 
is prone to neglect the study of the ordinary 
circumstances surrounding him, regarding them 
as commonplace. The wonderful songs of the 
birds, the hues of the flowers, the geometrical 
formation of the crystals in the caverns of the 
earth, the growth of the trees- — in fact, all 
Nature is one grand mystery, a mystery that 
will never be understood until man thoroughly 

99 



ioo The Will to be Well 

understands Himself, Then the knowledge will 
be disclosed to him that everything' in the world 
without corresponds to something in the world 
within, and through the Spirit he will read the 
Word; for the whole visible universe is the 
word of God expressed in form and set forth in 
speech. 

The mystery of man is the first to be dis- 
closed; for, when man knows himself to be the 
image and likeness of his Creator, he will under- 
stand all else. Among his mental faculties, 
perhaps the most mysterious is that of memory. 
We are constantly receiving mental pictures 
from the world without and from that within; 
and these appear to us either as beautiful truths 
or as unpleasant, disagreeable evils. Some of 
these pictures we regard with indifference, while 
others absorb our most earnest attention. 

Day by day we are writing the record of life's 
journey; day by day our minds are becoming 
filled with the pictures of life that are hourly 
occurring. Thoughts enter the mind and then 
seem to fade. But do they pass away ? By no 
means. We have a great storehouse wherein 
all incidents, both great and small, are stored. 
They all go to complete the book of life. They 
are the accumulation of experiences through 
which man eventually finds his way from earth 
to heaven — from the animal to the spiritual. 



Things Worth Remembering 101 

Nothing is forgotten ; everything, whether it be 
little or great, exerts some influence on our 
lives. Life is as truly made up of " little things " 
as of the so-called important events. The small 
incidents of life are treasured with greater ones. 
The kind word, the pleasant look — these are 
not forgotten. The harsh word and the angry 
frown likewise leave their impress. 

In man's life all that he has — all that he can 
truly call his own — are the experiences through 
which he has passed and the knowledge ac- 
quired from them. He may not regard his 
body as his own; the time comes when the 
planet claims that which it has loaned for a 
season. The one thing that man can claim for 
his own is the knowledge acquired through ex- 
perience; this can never be recalled from him, 
for it belongs to his spiritual nature. It is the 
knowledge of causes — not that which passes 
current in the world as knowledge — that fits 
him for true usefulness here and prepares him 
for the life to come. 

We are writing the book of life daily — even 
hourly. The enduring things we write in it, 
which will last when this world shall be no 
more, are those of the greatest importance, both 
in the present and in the hereafter, when all the 
unrealities inscribed therein shall be erased. The 
tares and the thistles must disappear; they must 



102 The Will to be Well 

be consumed by the fire that purifies. This 
shall be the harvest-time — when the true shall 
be separated from the false; when the sheep 
shall be divided from the goats ; when all these 
unreal conditions of life shall be cast into 
"outer darkness," and the soul shall become 
purified. 

Why should we so diligently sow the seed of 
tares and thistles instead of the good seed? 
Why should we seek to sow seed that in harvest- 
time will bring us but pain and sorrow? We 
are the arbiters of our own destinies. God 
endowed us with qualities analogous to His own 
— qualities that if used aright will bring us 
nothing but eternal gain. Why should we build 
on a foundation of straw and stubble, and in the 
end see our work destroyed, while we ourselves 
go through the furnace that purifies? Why 
not take the foundation that can not be shaken 
and build on it? 

What is this immovable foundation ? Simply, 
that life and intelligence are one ; that we must 
all work for the good of life — not in part, but in 
all ; that we must work with the forces of life, 
not against them ; and that we must know that 
all God created is good, was good, and ever 
shall be good. We should remember also that 
the mind must ever dwell on the good that is in 
us all; that no matter what the outer seems to 



Things Worth Remembering 103 

be, the inner good is ever there ; that, no matter 
how perverted a course the life-force in a man 
may take, still it is the veritable power of God 
working in and through the race. It may be 
wrongly directed; yet all force is one — all 
power is a unit. 

The life that reaches nearest to God and 
heaven is the life that sees good in all things — 
the life spent in doing for others. Selfish inter- 
ests, hopes, and desires are the seeds that bring 
forth in the harvest-time the tares and the 
thistles. They are the things from which, in 
the present, we expect to derive much gain; 
but they always fail to bring either profit or 
happiness, because these conditions can only 
come as each part works for the good of the 
whole and of every other part 

All the little and all the great events that 
occur in life are so many pictures stored away 
in the subconscious mind. With the faculty of 
memory we have power to recall them into re- 
newed activity. When we recall things good 
and true the whole action is good on both mind 
and body; when we recall things false and 
unreal they not only adversely affect the mind, 
filling it with gloomy forebodings, but also affect 
the body, weakening all its vital functions. If 
pictures associated with anger and hatred are 
recalled, they poison not only the mind but also 



104 The Will to be Well 

the blood that flows through our veins — having 
thus a destructive effect on the body. True 
pictures build up the body: false pictures tear 
down. We can not prevent the pictures that fill 
our mental gallery from entering the conscious 
mind; but we can see to it that these pictures 
shall be of so agreeable a nature that they will 
ever influence us for good, no matter how fre- 
quently they appear above the threshold of con- 
sciousness. 

Anything that declares the power of evil to 
be greater than that of good should have no 
place in our thoughts ; neither should anything 
that considers evil as a power, in and of itself, 
nor anything that shows forth discord and 
disease, find an abiding-place in the mind. In 
the book of life that we are constantly writing 
we should be careful not to inscribe those 
things that may eventually have to be cast 
aside. We should not, for instance, try to 
incorporate in our beings things false and 
unreal, which inevitably bring sorrow to mind 
and pain to body. We should build up an 
everlasting inheritance of things good and 
true. 

We remember many things we would prefer 
to forget — our own anger toward others and 
their anger toward us, the unkind word, the 
envious and malicious thought, etc. We re- 



Things Worth Remejnbering 105 

member things done that should have been left 
undone; also, things left undone through our 
neglect. We would gladly forget all these 
unpleasant things; but memory has a way of 
recalling them, and they haunt us both day and 
night. 

The Hindus believe thought to be a fine 
material substance, and that people in this life 
are making for themselves an environment that 
will assume the shape of their own thoughts, 
and before they can leave it they must outgrow 
all the unreal conditions they have formed. 
They must also be able to perceive their unre- 
ality before they can leave this environment. 
Whether this be true or not, there is no 
doubt that we are under the bondage or control 
of our own evil thoughts and desires; we 
are the servants and they have become the 
masters. 

We have, first of all, to remember that all life 
is one. We must not wilfully do anything that 
will retard the expression of life. We must work 
with all things tending toward perfection. We 
must be careful to picture in mind that which 
we know to be true ; for we are picturing it not 
only for ourselves but for others ; because what 
is in our own minds is continually affecting those 
of others. When we realize the effect of mind 
upon mind, then we see that we owe a duty not 



ro6 The Will to be Well 

alone to ourselves but to all with whom we come 
in contact. Let us remember that our true 
thoughts are going to prove helpful to many 
persons and that our false thoughts will prove 
injurious; also, that life is more beautiful and 
more worth living when we act honestly, justly, 
mercifully, and lovingly toward all. 

Through following this course we shall be 
storing in memory the things that, when re- 
called, will bring peace of mind and wholeness 
of body. Let us be sure that the seed we are 
sowing day by day is good seed, because the 
harvest will be after its kind. Men do not 
gather grapes from thorns nor figs from thistles ; 
they gather according to the seed they have 
planted. Therefore, how important it is to allow 
no thought to dwell in the mind that will not 
bring forth good fruit! We must never harbor 
thoughts that bring with them a sense of shame, 
or that if expressed would work the slightest 
injury to any of God's creatures. It is not to 
be expected that we are going to regulate our 
actions in perfect conformity to law; but Ave 
should so wish to live in accord with all that is 
good and true that our desire will ripen into 
perfect fruition. We should not only know the 
Higher Will, but live it and be it. And through 
doing so we should realize more of the power 
and goodness of God in our own lives — and 




Things Worth Remembering 



107 



should recognize more of those qualities in the 
lives of those around us. 



1 One Hand alone, 
One Hand has sway. 
***** 
To Him in wisdom turn. 




s* 



THE LAWS OF HEALTH 

M The glorious creature laughed out even in sleep. 
But when full roused, each giant-limb awake, 
Each sinew strung, the great heart pulsing fast, 
He shall start up and stand on his own earth, — 
Then shall his long triumphant march begin, — 
Thence shall his being date, — thus wholly roused, 
What he achieves shall be set down to him. 
When all the race is perfected alike 
As man, that is; all tended to mankind, 
And, man produced, all has its end thus far: 
But in completed man begins anew 
A tendency to God." Browning > s <. p ARACEL sus.» 

Health is essential to man's well-being, since 
happiness and success in life are alike dependent 
upon it. Man can not appear at his best in any 
line of activity if his body is diseased. Believing 
health to proceed from accurate knowledge of 
and conformity to the laws that regulate and 
control the life of man, I desire, as concisely as 
possible, to point out their nature and operation, 
I do not believe that there is any good reason 
why any one should be ill, but good health does 
not come to an individual without the exercise 
of some effort on his part; and the compensa- 
tion is far greater than that accruing from the 
same amount of effort put forth in any other 
direction. 

108 



The Laws of Health 109 

We all wish to be well and happy. There is 
only one way to reach this state. In the past 
we have sought it in the tangible substances of 
the world that lies all about us — to make our 
bodies well through the use of so-called material 
remedies — and sometimes they seem to help, 
though usually affording no relief Thus we 
have experimented year after year, trying first 
one thing and then another; or perhaps we have 
had no belief in drugs but have been very care- 
ful about our diet; or we may have studied the 
rules of hygiene and regulated our lives accord- 
ingly. And yet how few, with these aids alone, 
have been able to express perfect health and 
strength! We may not be censured for employ- 
ing them, for most others do the same until 
they find through experience that none of these 
things bring perfect wholeness or happiness. 

There is another realm, however, to which we 
have access — the world of the invisible, the 
world of cause, the world of the soul. "But," 
says one, " it is so far away that I can only hope 
to know it when the labors of this life are 
finished and God's kingdom is reached — when 
health and happiness shall be mine eternally." 
Is this the true view to take of human life here 
and now? Did not Jesus say that God's king- 
dom "cometh not by observation;" that we can 
not say, "lo, here!" or "lo, there!" for "behold, 



no The Will to be Well 

His kingdom is within you ?" Did not one of 
his disciples teach that "ye are the temple of 
God, and the Spirit of God dwelleth in you?" 
Even now is the day of salvation. Can the sal- 
vation that lives in a diseased body be complete? 
Is not the fulness of God's salvation offered for 
our acceptance at the present moment ? This is 
the message that Jesus tried to convey to the 
minds of men — -the glad tidings of which the 
angels sang: that the Father cares for His chil- 
dren and freely offers health and happiness to 
all who will accept these blessings. 

All good things are true because they have 
their source in God, in whom is " neither varia- 
bleness nor shadow of turning." The " turning " 
has all been done by us. We have turned away 
from the proffered gifts. We have not realized 
that all things are ours to enjoy. But before 
we can enter into the enjoyment of our universe 
we must have a knowledge of good in our indi- 
vidual lives. We must know that God is ever 
present, and that He " worketh within us to will 
and to do." When we have learned this truth 
the greater revelation awaits us : that God is the 
All-in-all, and that the soul, our real self, is sub- 
ject to no law but the law of God, which is the 
law of love. When this illumination enters the 
life it becomes changed; the old ideas pass 
away and all things are made new. The " new 



The Laws of Health in 

heaven and the new earth" have come into the 
life eternal, which is here and now. Only as 
this truth is lived and consciously realized, does 
it become a living reality in the individual life. 

Let us consider some of the things necessary 
to the adjustment of our lives to this divine law. 
A little study of self — a study that is perfectly 
honest and sincere — will bring to our minds 
many things of which we do not fully approve. 

At times our minds become anxious and even 
fearful; perhaps we allow anger, or malice, or 
jealousy to find lodgment therein. This wrong 
way of thinking and feeling makes the mind dis- 
cordant and unrestful, expelling all real hap- 
piness and mental peace. Moreover, mental 
discord and unrest are manifested in physical 
sickness and disease, because our bodies and 
souls are more dependent for health and strength 
on mental harmony and brightness than on 
either food or drink. We have been very solic- 
itous as to our bodily diet, but frequently we 
are heedless of the more important food of our 
minds. 

In reversing this erroneous course, let us be 
careful to start right. Perhaps for years we 
have been regarding ourselves as material 
beings, who might at some future time become 
spiritual, live in a distant heaven, and be and 
act altogether different from what we are and 



ii2 The Will to be Well 

what we do on earth. Yet the fact remains that 
heaven is within us. The spirit is the quickening 
power, not the flesh; and if the spirit of Him who 
raised up Jesus from the dead dwell in us our 
mortal bodies shall also be quickened through 
the same agency. 

What a change of mind would result if only 
these truths were realized — God working in our 
lives to will and to do ; the spirit within us the 
quickening power; the body only the temporary 
house that the spirit has builded for its use! In 
this realization the saying of Jesus is plain: 
" Destroy this temple, and in three days I will 
build it up." The ego is more than its body, 
and when we get the thought clear in mind that 
we are spiritual beings we will lay far less stress 
on the physical and pay more attention to our 
real selves. 

There is no other force or power in the world 
than spirit. God has given to each cf us a 
mighty kingdom to rule. By the control and 
direction of our individual lives through the 
immortal spirit we can realize the truth of this. 
It is only when we grasp more power than we 
know the use of — more than we have rightfully 
developed — that there comes the misdirection 
of energy that causes mental and physical dis- 
turbance. 

Sometimes through wrong thinking we shut 



The Laws of Health 113 

off our spiritual reservoir of power- — we limit 
ourselves. This condition comes through paying 
too much attention to the gratifying of worldly 
desires and not enough attention to cultivating 
the desire for higher things. The natural growth 
of anything should be as harmonious as that of 
a flower — accepting each day, each hour, as it 
comes, all that has been provided for its growth; 
yet we often ignorantly close the channel 
through which alone all things essential for our 
perfection can come. 

Only to man has God given the conscious 
power to control his personal life ; to make for 
himself what condition he wills; to create for 
himself a heaven or a hell. If the spirit domi- 
nates his life and he realizes his God-mind power 
and trusts absolutely to it, enlightenment and 
guidance will come through the indwelling spirit 
and he will express mental and physical health 
and strength. We should not seek to rule the 
kingdom that is beyond us, nor the one that is 
below us. Let us rule to-day, in the only king- 
dom that is ours, and day by day its powers will 
be revealed and we will reverence the God 
within the temple by keeping holy (whole) and 
sacred the sanctuary in which He dwells. 

Light enough is given to rule each day in our 
kingdom, but not enough "for the morrow;" 
and peering into the future will not enable us to 



/> 



ii 4 The Will to be Well 

live stronger or better lives. We live day by 
day, and if we live to-day thoroughly poised in 
mind, taking no anxious thought concerning 
anything, we will have fitted ourselves to live 
the morrow when it comes. 

Let us keep the mind clear and bright, fill it 
with wholesome thoughts of life, and be kindly 
in our feelings toward others. Let us have no 
fear of anything, but realize that we are one with 
universal power, — that power which can supply 
our every need, — that health, strength, and hap- 
piness are our legitimate birthright, that they 
are ever potential in our inner lives, and that our 
bodies may express them now. If we take this 
mental attitude and adhere steadfastly to it, the 
body will very soon manifest health and strength. 
There is no other way, and time is only wasted 
in seeking elsewhere the kingdom of God. 

The control of self, the direction of the whole 
life, has been committed to our care. We are 
to be faithful and not shrink from any of the 
responsibilities connected with it; for through 
such fidelity we shall hasten the time when 
health demonstrated shall be made manifest on 
earth " even as it is in heaven." 




/ 



SPIRITUAL TREATMENT 

"When divine faith, divine love, divine will, are united in 

one human being, this being becomes itself divine, becomes 

itself a master; his faith enables him to heal the body, his love 

to minister to the needs of the soul, while will gives him power 

to harmonize natural conditions." , T , ^ •, 

— Van Der Naillen. 

"In order for the highest wisdom and insight we must 

have absolute confidence in the divine guiding us, but not 

through the channel of some one else." t, ,, 7 ^ 

& — R, W. Trine. 

In considering the subject of mental treat- 
ment — more correctly, spiritual treatment, since 
other than mental qualities are involved in the 
giving of treatment — it is necessary in the first 
place to clear up certain misconceptions arising 
from the confusion of the different terms, body, 
soul, spirit, and mind. These words are apt to 
be used as though they related to separate enti- 
ties, or substances — or to modes of being which 
are separate and distinct in their reality, but are 
temporarily or casually brought into relation 
with each other. Or sometimes it appears to be 
held that body is not a reality at all, or even that 
body, mind, and soul are alike illusory, leaving 
spirit the only true reality. Now such a fail- 
ure to attach their true meanings to the terms 

115 



n6 The Will to be Well 

which we use in our thinking, necessarily leads 
to false and misleading conclusions. 

The truth — simple and plain enough for all to 
understand it aright — is that all life is one in 
essence, differing only in the degree and plane 
of its manifestation. The body of man is not a 
^ thing separate and distinct from his mind, inde- 
pendent of it, obeying other laws, subject to 
other rules. On the contrary, it is the outgrowth 
of mind, the manifestation of mind, that through 
which expression is given to the inner man upon 
the physical plane. On that plane and in rela- 
tion to it, body is reality, but neither independ- 
ent nor self-existent. It is conditioned ana ruled 
by the reality of the next higher plane of expres- 
sion, that is to say, by mind. Nor is the mind 
of man separate and distinct from his soul-life, 
though it is often so spoken of. It is that ex- 
pression of soul which relates man to the world 
of form and perception. It is the manifestation 
of life, upon the plane of thought. It is that 
which governs and controls body, and is in turn 
ruled and conditioned by soul. 

Soul, again, is the term which we use to de- 
scribe the highest expression of individual iden- 
tity. It is not different from or independent of 
spirit, but is one with spirit — a part of the uni- 
versal soul of all things. It is spirit subjected to 
those conditions and limitations which give rise 



Spiritual Treatment 117 

to identity. The oneness of life is expressed in 
and signified by spirit; its diversity in and 
through that oneness, by soul. These thoughts 
fairly grasped, it becomes comparatively easy to 
understand things aright — one life, and only one 
life, and yet that One Life manifesting itself in 
many ways and through many degrees. 

Jesus said of God: "God is Spirit," and the 
translators not being satisfied with that, trans- 
lated, "God is a Spirit." That little article a 
gives a very different interpretation to Jesus' 
statement. Spirit, as Jesus said, was God. When 
we use the word spirit, it means the universa. 
spirit, it means God. Again, when we come to 
the word soul, let us see that the soul is the dif- 
ferentiated spirit, t^ie individual spirit, the micro- 
cosm which contains within itself the complete 
picture of the universal God, the macrocosm. 
Let us see, then, that there is no difference be- 
tween the great universal soul and the individual 
soul, other than this one thought of differentia- 
tion, or individualization. The existence and 
reality of an inner state necessarily involve the 
existence and reality of an outer state. Accord- 
ingly it would appear that an outward state has 
ever been essential in the growth and develop- 
ment of man. 

Realizing, then, that there is a unity of life, 
we must not pick these different states or expres- 



n8 The Will to be Well 

sions of life apart and think or talk of them as 
though they were entirely distinct. We must 
see that they are in the last analysis all one; 
that man is a unit ; and that the universal soul 
again is a unit; that the life which flows through 
this grand organism is all one — One Life, One 
Intelligence. 

The importance of a correct conception on 
this point arises, so far as the present subject is 
concerned, from the fact that among the facul- 
ties that play a prominent part in the giving of 
treatment are some which we commonly regard 
as soul faculties and certain others which we are 
accustomed to consider mental faculties. First 
among the soul faculties stands the will of man, 
and that will, in turn, is one with the divine will 
of the universe. The true action of will in man 
is one with all will. Professor Dewey, of Ann 
Arbor, says that the will is man. It may be de- 
fined as the force of life in its voluntary outward 
expression. We see how it affects our own 
lives, and we see how it affects the lives of 
others. 

Working with will, guiding, stimulating, and 
directing it, we find faith, hope, and love. Now 
these faculties belong to and are the deepest feel- 
ings in man's nature. So far from being de- 
pendent upon or an outgrowth of mind, they can 
not even be pictured in mind, but transcend any 



Spiritual Treatment 119 

image that mind is capable of forming. They 
rise superior to anything known or recognizable 
in the mental state. Therefore, it is not possible 
to give any description in words — words being 
a development and expression of the mind — of 
these important and powerful states of feeling. 
We may possess them, we may experience them, 
we may know them in all the height and depth 
of which our natures are capable, but we can not 
describe them. Yet we may cherish and culti- 
vate them, and with the cultivation of these three 
mighty capacities in the life of man there will be 
generated certain other forces through the pos- 
session of which man may become of the great- 
est service to his fellow-men. 

Through the development of love, faith, and 
hope, man may come into possession of the 
magnetic force of his being; nor is this to be 
generated in any other manner whatsoever. If 
this appears to some to be denied by experience, 
if there seems to be magnetic force which, judg- 
ing from the manner and purpose of its use, 
must have arisen from some other source, re- 
member that for every real thing there is a tem- 
porary symbol manifested on the personal plane 
which practically contradicts that reality. Much 
in this world which masquerades as and strives 
to pass for real magnetism is not magnetism at 
all in the highest and truest sense of the word. 



120 The Will to be Well 

If we desire to possess this magnetic force, we 
can achieve it only through the cultivation of 
faith, hope, and love. 

How, then, shall we develop these qualities? 
Simply by exercising them in relation to people 
here in this world. Let them flow outward 
toward every person, every animal, every thing 
with which we come in contact, and the more 
freely we give the more freely shall be added 
unto us. As we give of our faith freely and 
fully to our fellow-men, as we pour out our love 
upon them in abundant measure, as we hope for 
them, and care for them, and do for them, in just 
that proportion will the faith and love and hope 
within our own souls flourish and grow strong. 
Thus and thus only may we confidently expect 
the development of the magnetic force in man. 

Now the electric forces in man arise from 
another source, namely, from the development 
of the intellectual part of man's being. Just as 
we recognize the magnetic forces as being in 
and of soul, so we must learn to realize that the 
electric forces are in and of mind. Hence it 
may be readily understood how it happens that 
many people possessing practically no magnet- 
ism whatever, yet, somehow, have developed, 
through the intellectual side of their being, a 
great deal of electric force. It is the perfect 
combination of ^nagnetic and electric forces that 



Spiritual Treatment 121 

is needed in this world to-day; and this involves 
the perfect development of both mental and 
soul faculties, not the cultivation of one at the 
expense of the other. Yet quite too generally 
"cultivation" and an "education" are taken to 
mean the training of the mind alone. 

Now it is an unfortunate fact that a person 
may be so warped through the development of 
the intellect alone that not a ray of soul-light 
can ever penetrate the outer mind to illuminate 
the inner being. People may be so warped and 
distorted through the study of books, through 
mathematics, philosophy, through metaphysics 
and theology, that they actually know nothing 
whatever of the soul-life. After all, the old 
Greek command, " Know thyself," points the 
way to life. Only as we come to know our 
inner powers, our power of love, faith, hope, and 
service, can we know God. True love in the 
mind of man was first begotten of the aid, com- 
fort, and assistance that he rendered to other 
lives. And the true love, commencing first with 
individuals, gradually extends until it takes in 
every living, moving, breathing thing, proceed- 
ing from the individual outward to the circum- 
ference of all things. 

We see, then, that in order to generate this 
magnetic force (which will be of the greatest 
assistance in giving treatment), it is necessary 



122 The Will to be Well 

that faith, hope, and love shall abide and wax 
strong in the soul of man ; thus existing, they 
must be felt in and express themselves through 
mind. These different states arise in the inner- 
most parts of man's being, and work from thence 
outwardly, revealing health and power in the 
mental and physical planes. So only can we 
come into true relation with our fellow-beings. 

Accordingly, we have now to consider the 
mental faculties used in the giving of treatment, 
among which the power of concentration and 
the imaging faculty of mind are most important. 
It is through this latter faculty — that of imaging 
or picturing in mind — that the healer is enabled 
to see what the man or woman he is treating 
should be, not what he seems to the outward eye 
to be, but what he should be and what in reality 
he is. 

The process which begins with the denial of 
everything evil is not a true one. It depends 
for its basis upon the assumption of the unreality 
of the body and so-called material things. But, 
as we have already seen, the body is a reality 
upon its own plane and in the degree in which 
the real unity of life is expressed through it. 
Hence, to deny the reality of disease and pain 
upon that plane is incorrect and only juggling 
with words. Indeed, the very attempt to deny 
away certain conditions can only result in em- 



Spiritual Treatment 123 

phasizing the reality of those very conditions. 
If you say, in good faith, that there is no 
sin, sickness, or disease, you have simply suc- 
ceeded in hypnotizing yourself into an erroneous 
belief. All these conditions do in truth exist. 
They are but transitory conditions, to be sure, 
through which the soul passes, but to him who 
is undergoing them and suffering from their 
effects they are very real ; nor can they be over- 
come and rendered non-existent by means of 
mere denial. 

Error is to be overcome not by the denial 
that error exists, but by affirming the existence ... 
and power of the eternal truths. Darkness is to 
be overcome by letting in the light, not by say- 
ing there is no darkness. Hence, this process 
which begins with the denial first of the phys- 
ical body of man — that through which he alone 
is expressed upon the physical plane — and con- 
tinues with the denial of sin, sickness, and dis- 
ease, has and can have nothing good flowing 
from it, nothing that can cause any soul to be 
one iota better. It is just like a little child in 
the dark saying, " I'm not afraid of the dark." 
The very fact that the child says this proves that 
he really is afraid. Every time you deny away a 
condition as unreal, you picture that condition in 
your mind, and hence perpetuate and strengthen 
it instead of lessening its hold on you. 



124 The Will to be Well 

Now there is another form of denial which 
stands on a very different basis, and it is a true 
one : it is the denial of the superiority of body 
over mind, the denial that the body can, of and 
for itself, do anything or feel anything, the 
denial that life on its higher planes of expres- 
sion can be affected by or suffer from that which 
only has validity and meaning for the physical 
plane. This latter form is no more denial of 
negation; it only arises, as we shall see later, 
from the assertion of the higher law. There- 
fore, in giving treatment, we image in mind 
things which are pure and good, we image the 
thought of the perfect man, the likeness of his 
Creator, without spot or blemish, and we put 
the whole force of our thought and will into 
that, instead of telling the sufferer that he is not 
sick or diseased. 

The one thing needful in this life is the full 
realization of the unity of life, the clear percep- 
tion that man is one with the Source of all life, 
and can never become in any way separated or 
detached from that Omnipotent Source. Once 
the mind of humanity realizes that truth in all 
its completeness, sickness and disease will exist 
no longer. When this becomes a living, vital 
force in the mind of any man, he will so regu- 
late his life that every thought, every action, 
will be a benefit to others. He will no longer 



Spiritual Treatment 125 

seek his own good but that of others, for he 
will know that his own life is bound up in the 
lives of others, of all mankind ; and that what- 
ever works good to others reacts on his own 
life, for peace and well-being. 

Many healers find it difficult to get true con- 
centration. Now this faculty is needed in treat- 
ment to a very marked degree. As has been 
said, we first image in mind the condition which ^ — 
we desire to see expressed in the patient. When 
that perfect image has once been obtained, then 
comes in the power of concentration to hold to 
that image, and to impress it upon the mind of 
the patient. All that is necessary for the healer 
to do for the time being, is to hold with his mind 
and thought to that one thing. The faculties of 
mind and soul are thus brought to a focus, just 
as the rays of the sun are gathered and deflected 
to a common center by a sunglass. And notice 
that while the rays of the sun are passing through 
the lens, there is very little heat apparent. The 
heat becomes manifest and effective only as the 
sun's rays reach the focal point. 

So it is with the powers of the soul and mind 
as they are affected by this faculty of concentra- 
tion. They will, aided by concentration, bring 
the thought or image formed in your mind to a 
focus in the mind of the patient. This done 
there need be no doubt as to the effect of that 



126 The Will to be Well 

thought. Remember that you have planted the 
seed — that is all. You do not give life. You 
give nothing except the thought. By means of 
that thought you are able to stir into activity the 
dormant possibilities of the patient's mind and 
soul. The power of God in that soul's life is 
what makes your work fruitful and productive. 
God giveth the increase. The healer supplies 
the medium through which that power passes 
to reach the patient; his will is the instrument 
by means of which that power is concentrated 
upon its subject. He only calls into a living ex- 
istence things that are latent in mind and soul. 

This being the healer's office, he should have 
no doubt in his own mind as to the effect of the 
treatment. Doubt in the healer's mind means and 
involves doubt in the patient's mind; for a false 
thought will then be given out with the true one. 
Therefore, have perfect faith that when the seed 
has been planted it will spring up and bring forth 
fruit after its kind. 

It is a great mistake to let the mind dwell too 
much on the results which are to be expected 
from the treatments. In reality the question of 
results is not for the healer to consider. The 
thing he has to do is to give the treatment — give 
it just as well as he knows how, put the whole 
force of his mind and soul into it, and the results 
will come. 



Spiritual Treatment 127 

Note, too, that there is a necessary condition 
in the healer's mind in order that treatment shall 
be effective. If your own mind is disturbed or 
unrestful, how shall you be able to give restful- 
ness to another mind? You say, "I think the 
true thoughts for that other mind in spite of the 
disturbed conditions of my own." Not so; for 
the other mind is in a passive and receptive con- 
dition. You are holding in mind — hence con- 
veying — false images as well as true ones. You 
have in mind images that would carry the 
thought of rest and peace, but you have also 
those that would bring disquiet and unrest. The 
true and false must go out together. Yet you 
wonder why your patients do not progress faster 
than they do. 

In giving a treatment the mind of the healer 
must be restful and peaceful, absolutely denying 
entrance to every doubt and every fear. The 
mind must be acted upon from the inmost depths 
of being: impulses of love, faith, and hope must 
dominate the mind exclusively. Thus will true 
thoughts alone eminate, and there will be no 
room for any false thoughts. When the light is 
truly shining there is no room for darkness. 
When the true thought is held in mind to the 
exclusion of the false, that true thought, going 
out from your mind, will affect the lives of others 
for good. 



128 The Will to be Well 

No thought can fail to have its effect upon 
some life. One can not meet another ever so 
slightly, can not converse with another for even 
five minutes, without influencing that other life 
to some degree. Either that life is better for 
having come in contact with you, or there re- 
mains with it some false impression which must 
be overcome. You have either added to life's 
burdens or lightened them, according to your 
thought. So intimately related is all mankind 
that our very thoughts, without spoken words, 
affect the lives of those about us. 

The question is often asked : Why is it that 
one can receive treatment from a Mental Scien- 
tist for months, and seem, after the first slight 
improvement, no better? In many cases it is be- 
cause he is content to let the healer do all the 
work; he is literally being carried by another. 
Now this is an impossibility for any length of 
time. All that any healer can do is to guide our 
feet into the way. It is we who must take the 
steps. 

All mental treatment aims to help people to 
help themselves, and if they refuse to exercise 
themselves unto Godliness, on their own shoul- 
ders alone lies the responsibility for sickness and 
suffering. From him that hath not (sincere desire 
and perseverance) shall be taken even that little 
possession of health which he seemeth to have. 



Spiritual Treatment 129 

Health, harmony, heaven (for they are all the 
same thing), can be realized only by men and 
women who are so deeply in earnest that they 
will give all that they have to secure the pearl 
of great price. 

Indeed salvation costs all that there is of a 
man. If we could understand that all this outer 
life of mind and body is but the symbol for 
reality then we would make more rapid progress 
in things eternal. But men persistently try to 
make the outside of the cup and platter clean 
and then wonder why no good results follow. 

For instance, take the matter of dissipation. 
To attempt to overcome the trouble on the 
physical plane alone is folly, for the cause lies 
further back than that. If a man habitually 
dissipates his will, centering it first on one sub- 
ject of desire, then on another, he becomes weak 
and diseased; and we all know the evil effects 
of mental dissipation. That old verse which 
reads, "God gave them their desires but sent lean- 
ness into their souls," has much good doctrine 
in it. 

Our prayers, that is our desires, are being un- 
answered all the time; and if we find our bodies 
in a lean or weak condition, if we discover a dis- 
eased or crippled state in the body, it is because 
we do not desire the good cf all men, but love 
personal benefit; our desires are mean and 



i 3 o The Will to be Well 

small, our concepts are crippled and false; our 
souls, lean. 

Whatever we earnestly desire we become one 
with. If we set our affections on partial benefits, 
that is, a good for one that is not a good for all, 
then we most assuredly will receive only a 
meagre allowance of physical and mental power. 
But if our love includes all men, if it is the 
whole good that we desire, then wholeness or 
health will, according to the intensity of our 
desire, be manifested in us. It is according as 
our concepts of life are true or false that we ex- 
press, in our various activities, power and fulness 
or disease and weakness. 

Now there is this thought, too, that I wish to 
leave with you, that new light means increased 
responsibility. Those who learn about this New 
Thought of health through soul-exercise and 
merely dwell in it intellectually without applying 
the truth in their own lives, are going to be 
worse off than if they had not known the truth. 
As Jesus put it, " If I had not come, ye had 
not sinned." 

''Where much is given much shall be re- 
quired." It is not enough merely to entertain 
those thoughts, but we must consciously relate 
ourselves in a vital way to the Reality which is 
in all and through all. We must shut our eyes 
to the outer darkness of the personal life with 



Spiritual Treatment 131 

its mean concepts and ambitions and open the 
eyes of the heart to the light of the universal 
life of love. 

In this world of ours many things masquerade 
as angels of light that are really far from being 
what they seem, although in every form of life, 
however imperfect, there is an element of truth. 

Take as an example this matter of healing. 
There are all degrees of power, some men pos- 
sessing a little, others a great deal. Two men 
having apparently the same intellectual under- 
standing of mental healing may reveal very dif- 
ferent powers in the practice of it. Why is this ? 
It is because in one case soul qualities abound; 
in the other mental activity predominates. 

There are two phases of power; one, the 
electric and the other, the magnetic. And then, 
too, in regard to magnetism, there is the false or 
the so-called animal magnetism, and there is the 
real or spiritual power. 

Electric power is generated through thought. 
A keen and strong thinker can control others 
through electric force, but the magnetic control 
springs from the realm of feeling; and when I 
speak of feeling I do not mean the emotional 
impulses which arise largely on the surface of 
being but those deep soul-feelings of faith, hope, 
and love. 

We need not worry in the least as to whether 



132 



The Will io be Well 



we are manifesting power. Our chief concern is 
with its realization. If we can realize love in 
our souls it will, without doubt, be revealed in 
our minds and bodies. 

So then let us give up once for all our depend- 
ence on outward form, whether it be the form 
of a person who seems to us the incarnation of 
power, or whether it be an institution; and let 
us aim always to see the life hidden within the 
man or organization, and give God the glory. 

So shall we be freed from a childish depend- 
ence and learn to walk in the Way of Life our- 
selves. 




THE LIFE OF POWER 

" Power is, in nature, the essential measure of right. 
Nature suffers nothing to remain in her kingdom which 
can not help itself. * * * Before a leaf-bud has 
burst, its whole life acts; in the full-blown flower 
there is no more; in the leafless root there is no less. 
Its nature is satisfied and it satisfies nature in all mo- 
ments alike. Man can not be happy and strong until 
he too lives with nature in the present, above time." 

— Emerson. 

To live naturally in any age means to adjust 
one's self naturally and therefore rightly to one's 
environment and the requirements of one's be- 
ing. When we live naturally we live harmo- 
niously. Unnaturalness in any degree evidences 
itself in discord. But God lives in every life — 
lives fully, unfailingly, despite temporary phases 
of partial development and obscuring experi- 
ences. Nothing can really separate us from 
God. By God I mean the great Universal 
Life that is in us, through us, and above us — 
the Universal Love that floods our being 
whenever we will open to it. 

We are living in a world where a constant 

133 



i 3 4 The Will to be Well 

readjustment is required. The demands of 
to-day are inadequate for to-morrow. It is 
through meeting new difficulties that we de- 
velop new powers — through overcoming that 
we grow strong. It is only through the facing 
and fighting of perplexities and troubles that 
we come to know life as it really is — that we 
truly learn the lessons of life. Each encounter 
awakens fresh powers of adjustment or resist- 
ance — for even resistance has its place on cer- 
tain planes. Everything indeed has its place — 
the so-called " evil," the shadows, as well as the 
good — the light. There are times when effort 
— real struggle — is required, and times when we 
find our realest good in giving ourselves up to 
the current. There is a time, too, for serious 
consideration of the vital things of life — a time 
to ask ourselves honestly if we are in our right 
relationship with things and people — with our 
daily environment. This adjustment to things 
and people is the true religion of life. Harmo- 
nious adjustment is all there is in life. We are 
so hedged about with forms and conventions and 
traditions that we seldom realize this. Relig- 
ion to many means something at least a little 
above the level of every-day life if not quite 
outside of it. Few as yet, it seems, under- 
stand that the simple, natural living of one's 
life — on the physical plane — in its physical 



The Life of Power 135 

outreachings and relationships as well as all 
others — alone constitutes the religion of life — 
alone conduces to right living. 

The balanced life — the life free from strain 
or tension — is the harmonious life. Even the 
straining after an ideal of action is erroneous, 
injurious. Straining after an ideal brings about 
distorted, inharmonious conditions. We may at- 
tain our goal, but it will be at the loss of some 
vital good. Right living, I repeat, is natural 
living. Nothing is really required of us that we 
are not equal to. If we are truly not equal to 
any test or crisis we may be sure we are striv- 
ing after impossible things — that we have set for 
ourselves an unnatural standard. Trust to Na- 
ture, trust fearlessly, honestly. Follow her 
leadings as does the little child the promptings 
of its heart. We allow too much strain and 
struggle to creep into our aspirations — our 
yearnings after growth. Struggle has its place 
indeed, but it does not mark " the better way." 
" Your Heavenly Father knoweth that ye have 
need of all these things " — even of growth — of 
outreachings of heart and soul and the satis- 
faction of these. 

Why take thought — anxious thought — for 
them, then? Why not let our unfoldment be 
as that of the lilies of the field — beautiful be- 
cause natural. There is but one unerring test 



136 The Will to be Well 

of naturalness — of right living — that is har- 
mony on every plane. If we are healthful, 
hopeful, happy, we may be sure we are living 
in accord with the laws of our being. If we 
are not, there is something wrong. In the 
earlier phases of nature — those that we call 
below us — the animal world — we see much 
that seems to contradict this. We see unre- 
stricted adherence to the laws of their nature 
and yet suffering — to the point of extinction. 
But all these things have their place — pain 
and battle, weaknesses and even missteps. 
We learn only by the great law of contradic- 
tions. We learn what strength is through our 
own weakness. Weakness is not an actual or 
final condition. We were all once weak; we 
are all weak now in comparison with some one 
or something else. It is only through tempta- 
tions and their overcoming that we know the 
better way — that we learn sympathy and gen- 
tleness toward others on the same road. We 
are too apt to approve or condemn both our- 
selves and others in our thoughts. Get down 
below the plane of thought, and feel. At 
heart we are all the same, you know — all one. 
If we are honest with ourselves we can not 
long misunderstand or criticize or stand aloof 
if we follow our better, deeper feeling. It is 
on the plane of feeling that we first realize our 






The Life of Power 137 

oneness with all — that wide, true sympathy 
comes. Our intellectul conceptions will differ. 

Knowledge must always be partial in the 
nature of things — there is no absolute knowl- 
edge. Through feeling we touch the deep un- 
derlying inspirations that come from the source 
of all life. Feeling is the true dynamic of life. 
Thought and action are only means of ex- 
pression for feeling. Even the so-called ma- 
terialistic scientists are coming to recognize 
this. Long before there was a brain cell in 
existence there was the capacity to feel. It 
was this capacity that developed the brain 
itself. 

The mind of each of us is the outgrowth of 
what we have felt. There is forever some- 
thing within us crying for completion — the 
Kingdom of Heaven within us demanding out- 
ward expression. The Kingdom of Heaven 
will never come on earth except as we bring it 
on earth. It is therefore the voicing of our in- 
most desire — through the effort to express 
what we feel — that deep, overwhelming, inex- 
plicable feeling that wells and surges through 
our being. 

If we deny expression to our feeling — deny 
its recognition and realization — we cut off the 
supply — stop the current and dry up the 
sources of our own life. Whatever we have 



138 The Will to be Well 

we must use or we lose it. This is the law of 
life. This is the natural way — this is the way 
of right living and righteousness. 

Love and service are all there is of life. To 
have we must give — give as the wind and 
the sun. Give continually, unquestioningly — 
" give to him that asketh of thee " ; give our- 
selves — not after due consideration and 
thought as to what is judicious, what is in ac- 
cordance with worldly wisdom — but give as 
our feeling prompts — sympathy, bread, life it- 
self if need be — if the need demands. We 
should take a larger, deeper view of life. 
There are few who would refuse a near rela- 
tive assistance. In reality, all living or who 
have ever lived are our near relatives. Any 
need that comes into touch with you has equal 
demand upon you. Some we can help better 
than others because they are on our plane of 
development, but in reality it is not our con- 
cern how our giving is received. " Give — give 
to him that asketh thee." If our own develop- 
ment is great we are thereby enabled to the 
more deeply and truly understand others. 
Only he who has lived can understand ; only 
he who loves knows. Because of our own 
needs and desires — either of to-day or of the 
yesterdays — we can give large sympathy to 
others and the better supply their needs. 



The Life of Power 139 

We want to live more largely. We want to 
dwell in thought and aim more on the great 
things of life — less on the inessential and 
superficial things. There can be no forgiveness 
for us until we have forgiven. We determine 
our own places ; we really determine every de- 
tail of our own lives. There is no power outside 
of us, compelling us — shaping our lives — order- 
ing our ways. It is for us to decide, to decide 
now — to-day, whether we will live natural lives, 
righteous lives, or false and artificial lives. It 
is not enough that we live in accordance with 
the laws that we ourselves or men who came 
before us have made. We call these laws, but 
they are not of necessity anything of the sort. 
The only laws are the laws of God written in 
the soul of man — the soul of each of us if we 
would but interpret them honestly, naturally, 
righteously. All seeming wrong or evil is 
only on the surface. All is pure among the 
basic things of life. It is only because our 
eyes are fixed upon the changing surface of 
things that we grow discouraged and dis- 
tressed or overwhelmed with the so-called 
evils of life. If we would look deeper we 
would see clearly, we could distinguish the 
real from the unreal, the fleeting from that 
which abides. The element of fire enters into 
the life to purify it. Experiences are of value 



140 The Will to be Well 

as they show us the realities. Whatever we 
desire, we are to believe that we have it — not 
that we are going to have it — to-morrow or 
some other time — but that we have it now, and 
we do have it. This is the law. If we want 
love we must give love, if we want harmony 
we must give harmony. There is a constant 
exhalation, so to speak, going on from every 
life. Despite our words, even despite our ac- 
tions, we are revealing our true selves, im- 
printing our inmost aspirations or shortcom- 
ings on the subtle atmosphere about us, on the 
sensitive consciousness of those we come into 
contact with. We can become anything we 
desire. We of necessity become one with 
everything we love. This is the only way we 
can ever know the universal oneness that 
means eternal life. "And this is life eternal, 
to know thee the only true God." God is love 
and love is God. To know love is to know 
God. To be one with God is to be one with 
man. There is no other way. Love of God 
must begin with love of man. Love must find 
its expression in service. " Love seeketh not 
her own," but nevertheless she finds her own, 
she can not fail of her own. In the life of love 
there is a constant outflow and influx. 

The natural life is the free life. Only truth 
can make us free. There is no standard of 



The Life of Power 141 

truth outside of ourselves. There is no book 
or preacher to decide truth for us. The truth 
that comes to the soul of each of us is the 
truth for each. But some one may say : " Should 
we allow mere feeling to guide us? Perhaps 
if we follow truth as we feel it to be, without 
reference to the opinions of others, it may lead 
us into strange ways." The final test of any 
course of action is the harmony it produces in 
the life. When I use the term " feeling " I do 
not refer to the fleeting impressions or momen- 
tary impulses that disturb the surface of our 
lives. I mean the innermost upwellings of the 
soul, the aspirations that come from the 
depths of our being. We set all sorts of guar- 
dians about the expression of these. How few 
of us seem outwardly what we inwardly really 
are! And yet why? We are all the same at 
heart. Why need we fear each other? 
Why simulate, why pretend? It is only as 
we do the truth we know that we will ever 
learn the greater truth we need ; only as we 
live freely and naturally that we can live truly 
— that we can ever come to know truth. Only 
as we live the truth is the Kingdom of God 
expressed through us. Only as we live our 
lives as God planned them, naturally, will the 
Kingdom of God have come on earth for us. 



MAN 

PAST, PRESENT, AND FUTURE 

" I have seen gleams in the face and eyes of the man that 
have let you look into a higher country." —Carlyle 

Everything worth knowing in this world re- 
lates itself in some way to man. Everything in 
the outer world of visibility corresponds to some- 
thing in man's inner world of thought; there- 
fore, we apprehend that the relations existing 
without and within are in reality one and the 
same. One is but the external expression, or 
clothing, of the other. 

St. Paul says there is a natural man and a spirit- 
ual man — first, that which is natural, and after- 
ward that which is spiritual. Now, the word nat- 
ural fails to convey his full meaning. The trans- 
lators did not give the true English equivalent, 
which is animal. We are told in the first chap- 
ter of Genesis that God created man in His own 
image and likeness. If that is true, was Paul at 
fault when he said : " That was not first which 
is spiritual, but that which is natural ; and after- 
ward that which is spiritual?" Viewed from 
one standpoint, this statement is seemingly con- 
tradictory; but from another we realize that it 

142 



Man 



143 



means that the spiritual man is Evolved while 
the natural (physical) man is evolved. What 
does this suggest? Take a sheet of paper and 
roll it up. It must be folded before it can be 
unfolded — which illustrates the principle that 
everything evolved must first be involved. 

The power of God was in the very first germ 
of man — right at the starting-point. Now, what 
would be the first thing to appear on this phys- 
ical plane of existence ? Naturally, the very last 
thing to be involved — expression. And so we 
find first on the earth the physical, or animal 
man. Evolution continuing, next comes the in- 
tellectual development of man; and lastly the 
spiritual. 

It is not so many years ago that men ate raw 
meat — that they lived almost without clothing, 
in caves, and watched their opportunity to 
pounce upon and kill animals to obtain sub- 
sistence. At first, man lived on wild vegetation 
and animal food. Later came the cultivation of 
the soil; and thenceforward we may follow 
man's progress in the pages of history. Every- 
thing tends from a lower to a higher state, and 
modern science teaches that the highest ape and 
the lowest man are not nearly so far apart in 
development as the lowest and the highest ape. 
When we study the early history of man we 
find him to be little more than an animal ; and 



144 The Will to be Well 

even to-day we find all the varying stages from 
the animal up to the spiritual man. We also 
discover that the tendency of the whole world is 
ever upward and onward. 

As man develops, there comes to him the idea 
that there must be something to worship — some- 
thing greater than himself — to which he must 
look with a sense either of reverence or fear. 
In the earliest ages the gods (for there were 
many deities) were either good or evil ; for man 
judged that when an effect seemed to be of an 
injurious nature there was an evil cause behind 
it; and whenever there was anything beneficial 
there was a power for good back of it. As time 
went on the gods became less numerous; and 
at last to some people came the thought of only 
two gods: the god of good and the god of 
evil. 

Throughout the history of the world the plan 
of the Creator seems to have been that some 
great minds should give to the people, at cer- 
tain stages, new light, so that they might ad- 
vance in intelligence. Even before the Jews 
became a nation, we find Abraham advocating 
one God, and standing almost alone for this 
unitary principle; hence the children of Israel 
always dated events back to their " Father 
Abraham." Thus also they spoke of " the God 
of Abraham." With Moses came the thought of 



Man 145 

law — law as ruling both the universe and the 
will of man. 

It was most essential that these great teachers 
should appear. They were as truly "sent of 
God" as was Jesus. They were veritable 
prophets : forerunners of greater events — the 
ideals to which men should seek attainment. 
Throughout the ages, when there was a need a 
great teacher supplied it. When people became 
divided into nations the thoughts of one nation 
were not those of another; and so their ideas 
were often radically different. 

The religion of the Semitic people — from 
whom the Jewish nation sprang — was grand, 
yet gloomy. They were a warlike people, and 
their deity, in the first stage of their evolution, 
was likewise warlike — a god who would take 
revenge by commanding them to destroy men, 
women, and children. There is very little in the 
Old Testament of a spiritual character, save 
portions of the Psalms and some passages in 
Isaiah. There is scarcely anything said of im- 
mortality. Yet all these stages through which 
the children of Israel passed were necessary. 
The religion of the great Aryan race was quite 
different; for it was a religion of brightness and 
hope. 

The different world-teachers came primarily 
to supply the needs of their respective peoples. 



i 4 6 The Will to be Well 

We are too apt to conclude that this world had 
only one great teacher, " sent of God/' and that 
the others were but ordinary men. God knows 
best the needs of all His children, and will sup- 
ply those of the Hindu and of the Japanese just 
as readily as those of the Hebrew or the Anglo- 
Saxon. Different minds receive according to 
their special trend. Now, if we can realize that 
Abraham, Isaiah, Confucius, Zoroaster (Zara- 
thustra), Socrates, and Plato were alike prophets 
of God, we will be more tolerant of other peo- 
ple's beliefs. The early Christians referred to 
Socrates as "the Christian before Christ." What- 
ever good we see in these leaders of men, or in 
the teachings of Christ, we may find in other 
great teachers. They have taught the same 
things; therefore, we know them to be good. 
If God gave the truth to one, he gave it to 
others. It may be expressed in many ways, but 
it is essentially the same, whether uttered by 
Buddha or by Jesus. All truth is from God. 

All these leaders of thought stood as ideals for 
men. Man realizes higher conceptions through 
approaching these different ideals ; therefore, we 
find Jesus saying, " If I had not come, ye had 
not sinned." Does any one suppose that Jesus 
brought sin into the world? No; but why did 
he make the above statement? Simply because 
he manifested a higher ideal than the world had 



Man 147 

received before ; and lack of conformity thereto 
constituted sin. This sense of sin in man is not 
something outside of himself. Two persons may- 
do the same thing, but in one case it may be a 
greater sin than in the other. It is difference in 
the underlying motive that makes a sin greater in 
one case than in another. One knowing the will 
of the Highest, and not doing it, will suffer more 
punishment — more unrest of mind — than another 
who knows and thus performs but little. 

Throughout the ages great teachers have ad- 
vocated certain great principles, or truths, that 
were given to the people just as rapidly as indi- 
vidual minds became capable of receiving them. 
Take, for instance, the doctrines that Jesus gave 
to the world. We say we believe them — that 
they are true; yet it is doubtful if we understand 
one-tenth of the things that Jesus taught. If we 
did understand them, would we not follow them 
more closely? Concerning those truths that he 
deemed most essential we are most negligent. 
All of us, at times, have been anxious about 
something — worried, or fearful. Do we realize 
that Jesus told us to "take no thought for the 
morrow?" It seems a small matter; yet he at- 
tached great importance to it — so much, in fact, 
that in substance he reiterated it. He meant, not 
that we were to shirk our duties, but that what- 
soever our hands find to do we should do it 



i 4 8 The Will to be Well 

with our might — that, however, we should not 
be doing in our minds to-day the things we are 
to do to-morrow with our hands. "Sufficient 
unto the day is the evil thereof," said Jesus; that 
is, if we use our God-given forces aright to-day, 
we will have no trouble to-morrow. 

On this seemingly small matter hang all the 
great things of life. It is not possible to keep 
the mind clear and the body well so long as we 
indulge in anxious, worried thought. Our belief 
in the things that Jesus taught is usually half- 
hearted. We prefer to follow certain prescribed 
rules and forms than to obey the laws that he 
enjoined upon the race. 

At present the world has no need of " great 
teachers." If we would live up to even one- 
quarter of the lessons taught by the great lead- 
ers of the past, it would be better for us; yet 
times have radically changed. The teachers of 
former ages (and there were many) were more 
conspicuous than they could possibly be in the 
present era. The people of those times were not 
capable of knowing half of that which is to-day 
common knowledge; and while, if we except 
Mahomet, no great teachers have come to the 
world in the past fifteen hundred years, yet there 
has been going on a " leveling up" process. 
People, as a whole, are learning more of the power 
of God in the individual life; hence, the world is 



Man 



149 



far in advance of what it was a few years ago. 
But it is doubtful if the race has grasped the true 
thought concerning the teachings of Jesus, or of 
Buddha^ Little by little we are advancing along 
those lines; yet both these teachers inculcated 
the non-resistance of evil — and when a person 
wrongs us in any way our first impulse is resent- 
ment. 

Jesus, realizing that all force and all life are 
one, saw that the good of life could be brought 
about most effectually by working with the force 
of life. Every form on this earth manifests the 
power of God; but, if the different forms are 
continually clashing, we have the " good " and 
the "evil." Man never succeeded in making 
any one better in this world through retaliation 
or any form of punishment. The only power in 
the universe that will overcome evil conditions 
is the power of God, which works for good at 
all times and in all places. The only thing that 
will overcome the darkness of the world is light. 
If we could realize also that evil must be over- 
come by good, we would begin to know more 
of heaven on earth. When we stop fighting 
evil, and work with all the forces that make for 
good alone, evil will be no more. 

Many persons assert that a time must come 
in the life of man when he will lay aside the 
form and will cease to be. They are not able to 



150 The Will to be Well 

see that things have been gradually working in 
the outer world from the protoplasm upward to 
man; and that something has entered the 
human soul — a longing, a reaching out, a real- 
ization that man is something more than he 
seems to be — that points to a reality beyond. 
We know that, as man goes through life, no 
matter what subject he investigates, the more he 
studies the more he finds to be discovered. If 
he lived to be ten thousand years old he would 
never be able to acquire a perfect knowledge of 
anything. If life begins with protoplasm and 
ends with mortal man, it is certainly a colossal 
failure; there is neither sense nor reason in it. 

Again, when we consider that it is not possi- 
ble for one material atom to be destroyed, or 
for one particle of force in God's universe to 
become lost, do not such facts point to the im- 
mortality of the soul? Do they not suggest 
that something lies beyond ? Why should this 
great longing enter the soul of man for some- 
thing that he feels must exist ? Everything in 
Nature really points to the immortality of life 
and intelligence. True, the form passes away; 
but its elements are not lost — they soon reap- 
pear in a new guise. 

The time will yet come when people will 
realize that the soul is of chief importance, not 
the physical body; when people will talk about 



Man 151 

the development of their souls, not their bodies, 
as is the present custom. If we were to give the 
same attention to our spiritual nature that we 
give to our physical states, we would be infinitely 
better off; but the form seems to engross our 
whole attention — the body is of more impor- 
tance than the spirit. 

We affirm our belief that man has a soul ; but 
we must reach the point of knowing that man is 
a soul. Then we shall find that the body, to 
which we have given so much attention in the 
past, really requires no thought. It will be 
strong and whole because it will express the 
wholeness of the soul-life. 

This may seem visionary, or of remote fulfil- 
ment; but it need not be. We can make it a 
living reality in the present. Each and every 
soul can prove the truth of these things, for it is 
not a matter of time; it is a question of realizing 
the power of God as an indwelling force in one's 
own being. 

Some say: "Well, I believe that to be true; I 
believe many people are realizing that fact: but 
I do not think it is for me." They are quite 
right; it is not for them while they think that 
way. But just so soon as they begin to think 
that it is for them, and that there is something 
within them that may be what it wills to be — 
because every soul when it wills to conform to 



i 5 2 The Will to be Well 

the laws of being may be well, strong, and 
whole through the power of God latent within 
it — then it is just as much for them as for 
others. One does not receive this power by 
proxy. He must realize it for himself. Another 
may tell about it and point out the path; but if 
one would know all about it he must walk 
therein. 

A great many people would like others to 
assist them through life — to make the way as 
easy and as pleasant as possible; but it is not in 
that manner that a knowledge of truth may be 
obtained. We must work out our own salva- 
tion. We must individually develop a knowl- 
edge of this power that God has implanted in 
our being. Let us try to realize the importance 
of life — that we are not here simply to have a 
"good time," to accumulate money, or to get 
certain honors from our fellow-men. Let us 
learn that there is something of far greater im- 
portance to us — the development of our own 
God-given powers. There is nothing on earth 
that can mean so much to us as that. It fits us 
to deal with life here : it will fit us to deal with 
life hereafter. 



THE WAY OF SALVATION 

"The God of grace and mercy gives to each that which he 
craves for. If we think that all is well with us, He will leave 
us to try whether all is well. If we find that there is some- 
thing that is not well, something that must be set right in us, 
He will set it right." _ p D Maurice . 

" You have not lost what God has only hidden. You lose 
nothing in struggle, in trial, in bitter distress. If called to 
shed thy joys as trees shed their leaves: if the affections be 
driven back into the heart, as the life of flowers to their roots, 
yet be patient. Thou shalt lift up thy leaf-covered boughs 
again. Thou shalt shoot forth from thy roots new flowers. 
Be patient ! Wait ! " _ H enry Ward Beecher. 

"Obey God. His laws to the snow-flake are designed to 
make it beautiful and useful. So are His laws to you. He 
tells the flake to put on such a form and go to such a place, 
and it goes without murmuring or reluctance. Obey God, and 
you will put on the beauty of holiness and bless the world." 

— Kirk. 

There are a few points that I want to empha- 
size strongly, because many people study into 
the New Thought for weeks and months with- 
out making any progress, just on account of fail- 
ing to grasp vividly certain basic truths. 

Let us remember then that in order to fully 
realize heaven here and now, it is essential that 
we throw ourselves entirely and unreservedly 
into the endeavor to attain a perfect balance be- 

153 



154 The Will to be Well 

tween the inner and outer man, keeping in mind 
the fact that the external is but the symbol of the 
internal, that as we maintain harmony within 
and hold ourselves — our external selves — re- 
sponsive to this inner harmony we will express 
perfect health in body and mind. 

We must not forget that in so far as we wish 
for our own good, and disregard that of others, we 
really take away from the benefits coming to us, 
for humanity is so related that that which brings 
benefit to one and deprivation to another is not 
real benefit at all. We should desire only that 
which will bring good to those about us if we 
wish to have the full benefit of the good our- 
selves. It is a false concept of life that considers 
only self, and one that will certainly reflect in- 
harmony upon the body. 

We must not dissipate our forces by frequently 
changing our object of attainment; but we must 
decide exactly what we want, and then earnestly 
set about getting it, feeling confident that we will 
possess it in time. Only in this way will we 
realize our desires. 

We express disease or health according to the 
nature of our thoughts — according to how we 
direct and control our thoughts through the 
exercise of our God-given will-power. And 
there are different degrees of power. The more 
light that is shed upon our understanding, the 



The Way of Salvation 155 

more are we responsible for the use we make of 
life. Then, too, we must not only grasp the New 
Thought intellectually, but we must feel it in our 
inmost being, and live it. Those of us, who have 
much light and yet are too lazy or indifferent to 
live up to our light, will be far worse off than 
those who, knowing but little, yet live up to what 
they do know with sincere endeavor and earnest- 
ness. Therefore, let us put our entire energy 
into the practical application in our daily lives of 
what stands to us for truth. Nor are we to con- 
cern ourselves as to whether we are manifesting 
power so long as we know we have it. For 
power within is bound to leave its impress, in 
time, externally, in renewed bodily vigor and 
mental growth. 

Above all things let us remember that we do 
nothing of ourselves; that it is God working 
through us, using us as an instrument for the 
manifestation of His power. Thus must we give 
the glory to God. 

As we are freed from dependence on things 
outside ourselves and look within for that light 
which is the essence of God Himself, so will we 
cease to lament for that which seems hopeless, 
knowing that if we conform to the law of God 
we may transform all evil into good. 

We must at last come to see that no matter 
how evil a thing may seem to be it is only evil 



156 The Will to be Well 

in that it is a partial expression of truth, and 
that " when that which is perfect is come then 
that which is in part shall be done away." 

It makes no difference how repulsive or dis- 
couraging a man's exterior may be, there resides 
within a potential god; and we may hate dis- 
cord, disease, sin — they are all one — with a 
deadly hatred, and yet love the real man who is 
dwelling in darkness. Indeed, if we love the 
lovely, and long for its full revelation in every 
human being, we will not acquiesce tamely in 
present conditions, but will give ourselves, heart 
and soul, to the attainment of health in ourselves 
and in others. 

Now just here we need to remember that 
while we ought to be passionately in earnest we 
must also be patient; we must not lose courage 
even if we can not always see results so soon as 
we would like. 

In the first place, let us reinforce ourselves 
with the thought that in God's great universe 
there is no such thing as failure. "Love never 
fails." If we do, then it is because we have not 
been loving enough. Yet, even so, the failure is 
only apparent, for there is in reality a steady 
progress toward the goal of life in its fulness. 
We must turn to Nature if we would realize this 
clearly, for there we see so plainly the element 
of periodicity. Winter succeeds summer; but 



The Way of Salvation 157 

it is not stagnation, death, or failure ; it is merely 
the period in which strength is being accumu- 
lated for a new output. And so it is with man. 
He grows visibly only in periods, and then there 
follows a time when he is gathering force for the 
next plane of activity. Even those who seem 
most hopelessly sunk in gross sin are in reality 
nearing the time when husk-feeding shall be 
found unsatisfying. Remember, we do not all 
arrive at the consciousness of the self in the same 
way, but, somehow, each is coming to himself. 

So, then, we might better give up trying to 
find persons in whom we can trust, for the per- 
sonal element is always changing, and throw 
ourselves unreservedly on God who dwelleth 
in all men. Let us seek to become one with the 
Spirit ; for then and only then can we become 
united with our brothers in a wholesome way. 
It is so natural to pick and choose our compan- 
ions, to turn from the degraded and sinful and 
associate only with the good and true; yet that 
is not Love's way, for it is the lost ones whom 
Love lives to save. 

But right here we must be on our guard 
against forcing the truth (in words) on any one. 
It has been well said that " God screens us ever- 
more from premature ideas," and until a man 
has grown ready for truth he can not receive it 
— that is, in the form of the spoken word, for 



158 The Will to be Well 

always love incarnate is timely. One must 
hunger before he can be fed; and it is in this 
sense that Christ warned us against casting our 
pearls before swine. In every case there must 
be the demand before there can be the supply. 
"Give to him that asketh"; and even God does 
not force Himself on us, but awaits our free ap- 
proach. Always the initiative must come from 
within. 

The trouble with this whole weak, sickly 
body of humanity is that we do not will to be 
well. We make no demand; we are lazy and in- 
different. Truly, God is more willing to give us 
good gifts than we are to ask Him. 

There is nothing selfish in desiring to be well 
and strong, but quite the reverse — that is, if we 
desire health because we love wholeness. Our 
selfishness generally shows itself in the other 
way — we will not exert ourselves to be well. It 
costs too much. In this matter of healing there 
must be no slothfulness, nor must there be a 
haste that indicates lack of faith. Patience, per- 
severance, and peacefulness must all play their 
part. 

Do you not see that this whole matter of life 
is most simple, yet mbst heroic? When we once 
see the bond that unites us all to each other 
and to the Father — that bond of love which will 
yet harmonize all activities — we will abandon 



The Way of Salvation 159 

forever our false hope of being saved by an ex- 
terior force and will set about in earnest to the 
great work of self-unfolding. 

Society awaits the racial attainment of true 
individuality, and this can be achieved only 
through our knowing and revealing in thought, 
word, and deed the God within. Then let us 
strive, each day of our lives, to become more 
simple-minded and more true. Let us pour out 
freely all that there is of us and trust the Father 
to guide us every moment in the paths of peace. 
So shall all the sons of God come, in time, into 
the unity of the faith, into the measure of the 
stature of the fulness of Christ, and the kingdom 
of heaven be realized on earth. 




THE KINGDOM OF GOD 

"Oh man, know thyself ! In thee is hid the treasure of 
treasures." 

41 Seek to converse in purity with your own pure mind and 
with God. The first and highest purity is that of the soul." 

— Epictetus. 

"The human heart is like heaven: the more angels the 
more room." — Frederika Bremer. 

"What men have known of God is not in books, but in the 
soul. What Jesus knew of God is not in the gospel statement, 
nor did he ever intend it should be. It was in him; and we 
see it, feel it, know it, wherever and whenever we meet him " 

— E. F. Hay ward. 

"Of all the teachings, that which presents a far-distant 
God is the nearest to absurdity. Either there is none, or He 
is nearer to every one than our nearest consciousness of self." 

— George Macdonald. 

Some people, in accepting the New Thought 
truths, practically deny the existence of the outer 
world, as if being were all and doing of no con- 
sequence whatever. 

Now in a very true and deep sense being is 
all, yet if there is a realization of love, faith, and 
hope, — if there is a consciousness of life, — it 
must and will find outward expression; the king- 
dom of God is continually and in increasing 
measure being realized on earth. When I speak 

160 



The Kingdom of God 161 

of the kingdom of God I do not refer to some- 
thing of which man can know nothing in this 
life, but of that which is ever within him. It has 
always been abiding quietly within, yet man for 
the most part has not been conscious of it. All 
that is beautiful^ all that is true, noble, generous, 
heroic — all in fact that is good — is the kingdom 
of God; and it abounds continually and in all 
places even though we are blind to it. 

Man, in order to understand his own king- 
dom, must first understand God's, and naturally 
this apprehension of truth and beauty is a 
gradual process. Even in the case of Jesus we 
can trace a very decided growth in his compre- 
hension of truth. At first he habitually speaks 
of himself as the son of man and it is not until 
near the end of his work that he calls himself the 
Son of God. 

Now these two expressions do not imply two 
separate and distinct personalities, because all 
through his earthly activity he was one and the 
same man; but in his case, as in that of us all, 
there were two phases of growth : the personal, 
which has most to do with the outer world, and 
the impersonal, which is concerned primarily 
with the inner realm. 

Jesus passed through precisely the same ex- 
perience as we all must; he was tempted to yield 
to the allurements of the outer world, he was 



1 62 The Will to be Well 

tried by every possible appeal to his lower na- 
ture, and grew strong only as he steadfastly 
looked within for the realization of his happiness 
and power. In a very true sense he was always 
the son of man, but in still deeper sense he was 
the Son of God. Many people followed him, 
up to the point where he declared himself to 
be one with the Father, and then they turned 
against him. Yet he only took that high ground 
when he realized his -full power over the outer 
world ; and we can note the gradual process by 
which he came to know his kingship. It was 
only as he was true and steadfast to love — the 
all-inclusive love — that the consciousness of a 
greater than outward dominion came to him. It 
was as Jesus more and more freely came to do 
the will of God that he came more and more into 
the consciousness of the inner power which was 
his. He knew beyond all possibility of a doubt 
that he had power to lay down and power to re- 
build his outer covering, and he finally declared 
fearlessly that he was the Son of God with an 
eternal inheritance and power. 

Now Jesus' way is our way. We all have to 
pass through the same experiences in life. We 
must all meet those same appeals to the sense- 
nature, to the desire for bodily comfort or ease 
or power, and all of our trials are sent to prove 
us, to make us strong through resistance. No 



The Kingdom of God 163 

trial ever comes to us without strength being 
given us to meet it; but if we shut the door to 
the higher consciousness, then of course we will 
feel helpless in the face of temptation, The outer 
world, man's kingdom, can not be controlled 
unless we are first aware of the inner kingdom 
of love — of God. 

Now the reason why I call the outer world 
man's kingdom, is because it is this over which 
he must achieve dominion. He must attain unto 
power over all things below him; he must not 
be subject to any outward thing, must not de- 
pend upon matter, or be enslaved by personal 
ambitions, but must awaken unto his own inner 
self, his own love-nature, and reveal it fully in 
the outer world. 

So we consider, first of all, God's kingdom, 
that realm of faith, hope, and love through which 
alone real power and dominion can be ours. We 
must begin at the very heart of things, for so 
only can we understand the outer world which 
is the expression of the inner. First, then, there 
is the great realm of feeling. We are all con- 
scious at times of a feeling of power, of vitality, 
of strength, though we find it hard to explain to 
another our conditions. Yet this consciousness 
of a hope that springs up within us, vivifying 
and strengthening us, is more real than any out- 
ward thing. It is really the fountain-head from 



i6 4 The Will to be Well 

which everything else proceeds. Feeling is 
more real than the thoughts we think. Indeed 
the character of our thoughts depends entirely 
upon our feelings. Thoughts rule the outer 
world, it is true, but they in turn are ruled by the 
inner life — the God within. 

Feeling is, after all, the important thing. It 
is only as we become conscious of a deep and 
all-inclusive love that we come to know God. 
Jesus declared God to be love, because he had 
experienced the all-powerfulness and all-suffi- 
ciency of love. We all come to know in the 
course of time that the more faith and hope and 
love we can realize in our inner life the more 
Godlike we become. It is only as we turn our 
backs on God's kingdom and become absorbed 
in the outer life that unkind or untrue thoughts 
arise. If we live entirely in man's kingdom — 
the outer world — our impulses are unreliable; 
they maybe good or they maybe false. We can 
not be sure that our acts are prompted by God. 

It is feeling — the deep soul-feeling — which 
acts upon the mind and body for good. It re- 
news the mind, and so remakes or renews the 
body. Only so can the body be quickened and 
built up. If we are going on day by day living 
in ruts, thinking the same old thought over and 
over, then the body will grow old because the 
mind will become aged. 



The Kingdom of God 165 

Now we ought not to grow old, that is; old in 
the sense of a hardening or stiffening, or lack of 
life. We are going contrary to God's will when 
we grow old through worry, sorrow, or disease; 
the only way in which we should grow old is in 
the sense of larger experience — old in knowl- 
edge, in love, in power. Let us believe that the 
way of life is not the way of sin, sickness, or 
death. 

Now, until we learn the God-given way, we 
must of necessity go through all the outer trials 
and experiences ; for so only can we come into 
a knowledge of law. There is a "strait and 
narrow way," and we are all trying to find it; 
but because of our impure desires, our selfish- 
ness, we stumble and grope about for years. 

The eternal way, the life of God, the kingdom, 
is here now, and has always been. We have but 
to enter by the gate of love to know God and 
have abundant life. 

There is really no such thing as death, though 
we live in the thought of it. All is really pro- 
gressing, all grows toward a grander, fuller life, 
though we are not always conscious of growth. 
Nothing can ever die; the energy of the out- 
ward form passes on into new forms; even the 
atoms are indestructible. When our bodily 
covering can no longer express the soul-life, 
when it becomes unfitted for its tenant, the soul 



1 66 The Will to be Well 

passes on to build elsewhere a better body. The 
builder has not died, and he has had all the ex- 
perience of his earthly life which will enable him 
to build better in the future. There is no waste 
in this world of love. Even that earthly life 
which seems to go out in darkness, because of 
failure to know and reveal God, has in reality 
grown somewhat during its sad experiences 
here. 

Life is indestructible, and the mere fact that 
the departing tenant lives, guarantees his power 
to build a new temple; for life must be clothed 
upon in some form. The place where this build- 
ing shall occur is not important ; some say here, 
some say elsewhere. The essential thought is 
the continued existence of the builder. 

Everything we do is the result of law; we 
may be unconscious of its operation, but that 
does not alter the fact. Nothing ever happens — 
there is no chance. 

The law of attraction works ceaselessly. It is 
through our desires that we become related to 
one another, and it is through the law of attrac- 
tion that our needs are supplied. What we truly 
need will come to us. Let us keep this thought 
in mind and so shape our desires that we will 
attract to ourselves only the best. 

Now when any problem presents itself to us 
we can be sure that we are equal to its solution 



The Kingdo?n of God 167 

or it would not arise. We may feel unequal to 
the situation, but if so it is we ourselves who have 
introduced an element of weakness. Sooner or 
later we must meet every problem in a satisfactory 
way to ourselves; for the workman must be sat- 
isfied with his work. We gain nothing by dodg- 
ing an issue; it does no good to run away. Our 
work is to face every situation bravely and 
honestly, and go through, not around it, with all 
energy and grace. If, on the other hand, we 
refuse to meet our problems, they will come 
back again for solution, and each time it will 
be with, renewed force, and they will seem 
more difficult, they will appear like greater prob- 
lems. 

We might as well look at things in a strong, 
true way, and not waste our energy by gazing 
into the future. It is the present situation with 
which we have to deal. Meet it, then, fairly and 
squarely, with the determination that you will 
go through it lovingly. Each one of us has 
something to do, and something each hour of 
our lives. Each condition that arises is a means 
of growth, a testing-time; and if instead of 
shrinking from it we put our whole minds into 
it and study to see how well we can meet 
the issue, we will grow strong, and well, and 
happy. 

If we are not growing we are encumbering 



ie>8 The Will to be Well 

the earth — simply drifting. Some people seem 
to have no trials; they seem to sail or drift 
through life. But the time always comes when 
they are obliged to meet hardship, for without 
that there can be no development, no entrance 
into life. 

The promise of the kingdom of God is only 
to him that overcometh. There can be no king- 
dom for those who will not overcome, for it 
comes only to those who are fitted to reign. 

Now, if we refuse to be masters in small 
things how are we ever to learn to rule in the 
great? If we conquer each situation in the true 
and loving way, then there will enter an element 
of joy and strength, and we will become con- 
scious of power such as we never dreamed 
possible. 

After all, the real satisfaction of life comes 
through doing, not in having things done for 
you. The more we become able to do, the 
happier we will become. It is not possible for 
us to be contented or happy while we are serv- 
ing only our own personal interests. Our 
thought should be: What can I do to make the 
world brighter, to give health and strength to 
others ? Now, if this is our desire, we will never 
be without work; things will come into our lives 
because of the readiness, the eagerness, to help. 
There will be a demand for us, and through the 



The Kingdom of God 



169 



work that comes, if we meet it faithfully, we will 
realize more strength and power. 

A beautiful feature of this life of love is that 
the more you think and do for others the more 
you receive yourself. In giving we always re- 
ceive. This is one of the great laws of life. It 
is the nature of love to grow by constant ex- 
ercise. 




THE SPIRIT OF PRAISE 

"Shall I not call God the Beautiful 
Who daily showeth 
Himself to me in His gifts ? " 

— Emerson. 

"Love, the true love of God, is the love of His truth, of 
His Holiness, of His whole will." iT 

1 * Thank God every morning that you have something to 
do that day which must be done, whether you like it or not. 
Being forced to work and to do your best will breed you a 
hundred virtues which the idle will never know." 

— Charles Kingsley. 

* ' I too may yield 
To Heaven a silent offering of praise. 
Earth may not know that I have ever been; 

Yet pleasure to the eye of Heaven to give. 

And thence, one sweet, approving smile to win, 

Is, sure, no worthless mission to achieve." 

— H. E. B. 

Praise is a spontaneous action of heart and 
mind. When one is filled with a spirit of praise 
it becomes necessary for him to find some mode 
of expression. The Psalmist exclaims, "Bless 
the Lord, O my soul, and all that is within, bless 
His holy name. * * * Who forgiveth all thine 
iniquities, who healeth all thy diseases. * * * 
Who satisfieth thy mouth with good things; so 
that thy youth is renewed like the eagle's," and 

170 



The Spirit of Praise 171 

we know that back of the words lies a heart full 
of grateful praise to God. 

One of the conditions of health is a spirit of 
praise; and many people limit themselves, in 
every possible direction, by neglecting to praise 
God for His goodness. This is not because God 
requires formal thanks from His children, but 
because a sympathetic responsiveness to His 
loving-kindness is an absolute necessity if we are 
to grow in grace. % 

But many people say: "Of course I know 
God is good, yet life seems so hard; there is so 
much malice, jealousy, strife, and bitterness in life, 
so many trials, and so much suffering, that it 
seems difficult to find cause for thanksgiving." 

Now, if we could only realize that we see in 
others the very characteristics which are in us, 
and that if we think the world a gloomy place 
it is because we ourselves are gloomy, then we 
would know how to go to work to cultivate the 
spirit of praise. 

" Charity begins at home" in a deeper sense 
than many have imagined. To see beauty with- 
out we must first see beauty within. As Emer- 
son has so finely expressed it: "God did not 
make some beautiful things, but Beauty is the 
creator of the universe." To know God in the 
soul is to live in a realm of beauty and strength 
and to rejoice evermore. 



i 7 2 The Will to be Well 

Let us get the thought firmly fixed in mind 
that the soul is God ; that there is really no im- 
perfection within; that the real being is love 
itself. Then will we cease our faithless crying 
unto God for this or that outward benefit and 
will give ourselves heartily to the work of ex- 
pression. The world, heretofore, has thought 
possession was the great blessing — the end for 
which we should strive. But as a matter of fact 
we really possess all things and need only to 
express them fully on the earthly plane. The 
imperfections of life concern only the province 
of expression. The whole matter of growth is 
merely a matter of finding one's self and then 
learning how to give a complete revelation of 
soul on the mental and physical planes. 

It is most interesting to note the gradual 
awakening of a little child to its own identity. The 
first things of which the baby becomes conscious 
are entirely outside of himself — a bright object 
or some moving body; then after a while his 
own hands and feet absorb his attention; and so 
he travels in his search of himself, always from 
the exterior to the interior realms; the order 
being, first, physical consciousness, then mental, 
and, lastly, spiritual knowledge. 

Now, the race passes through the same grad- 
ual awakening; and for long ages the world has 
been dwelling in the personal stage of conscious- 






The Spirit of Praise 173 

ness. Personality, to the general run of men, is 
the most interior self; whereas that, like the 
mind and body, is only a channel through which 
the real self speaks. Even Jesus refused honor 
as a person, for he knew that there is no such 
thing as personal power. Power, glory, beauty, 
strength — all are in and of God, and they all re- 
side in the secret place of the soul. Our business 
is to know these real properties and to let them 
shine through our persons. So only can men 
glorify the Father. 

We hear a great deal nowadays about 
psychic development as if it were synonymous 
with spiritual life ; but we should make a clear 
distinction between the two. There certainly is 
a mediumship which is profitable to all men, and 
if the mind is open for the reception of all true 
and uplifting thought there ss no loss of perfect 
self-control. But where we give our bodies up to 
the control of any other mind than our own we are 
making a great mistake which can only result in 
the weakening of our will and power without its 
bringing any gain to the mind that controls. 

Spiritual life has to do with the great soul- 
qualities of faith, hope, and love; but earthly 
mediums are sometimes noticeably lacking in 
these respects, while their psychic powers may 
tend to retard the growth of other souls in the 
knowledge of God 



174 The Will to be Well 

Jtfc There are doubtless many latent powers in 
man which shall yet blossom into true useful- 
ness for the healing of the nations; but the gifts 
of clairvoyance, clairaudience, telepathy, and the 
like, should not be used for mere personal grat- 
ification, or for the benefit of curiosity-seekers. 
Furthermore they should come as the result of 
natural development rather than as something 
that is forced or abnormal. 

It is through our misuse of power that we 
bring down upon olir heads the woes of life; 
and it is only through knowledge — the deep 
*«^ sciy-lrknowledge — that we can ever expect to 
escape pain or trial. God's punishments are not 
arbitrary; they are merely the operation of law. 
If we persistently go contrary to law then we 
must suffer. But pain is, after all, not a curse 
but a blessing, for it is through its stern ministry 
that we become conscious of wrong-doing and 

set about^feringing ourselves into conformity to 

I 
law. 

When man has sought diligently throughout 

the external realm for power and happiness and 

has become conscious of his failure to find that 

which he needs, he at last begins to seek within \ 

and as he persistently travels farther and farther 

into the heart of things, passing clear through 

the physical, n&ntal, and personal realms, he 

finally comes into touch with God and exclaims 



/ 



The Spirit of Praise 175 

in joy : " Praise the Lord, my soul, * * * 
Who satisfieth thy mouth with good things!" 

This subject of food is most important. We 
all realize the need of food for our bodies, but 
that is as nothing compared to the nourishment 
needed by the soul. It has been apprehended 
by seekers after truth, that physical food is not 
enough. It has been said that man shall not live 
by bread alone, but by every word of God; and 
those who have fed on the Word have found that 
a strength and vitality is theirs, far greater than 
any which could be derived from physical food. 

Now, as in the body there must be digestion 
and assimilation, so in the matter of spiritual 
nourishment we must thoroughly apprehend the 
truth that we feed upon, and then incorporate it 
in our daily activities. Spiritual food must be 
allowed to take shape in the outer world of ex- 
pression just as the physical food is built into 
the physical form. 

It is really saddening to see how materialistic 
the majority of people are. You hear them ad- 
vocating this or that food to make people thin 
or stout, to quiet the nerves, or to make them 
strong, never dreaming wherein true strength 
and graceful proportion consist. They say that 
certain kinds of food contain certain properties, 
and that if the physical organism is lacking in 
these properties one should eat a particular kind 



/ 



i 7 6 The Will to be Well 

of food. Some eat foods containing fatty sub- 
stances, yet they do not get fleshy. Why is 
this? It is impossible to explain all these things 
on physical grounds alone. 

When you are trying to build up the body by 
means of a certain diet, you are dealing with 
effects instead of with causes, and so there is no 
permanent benefit. 

Then again the question is often asked : What 
about physical exercise — is it not beneficial? 
All things are good in their proper place. The 
mistake consists in looking to the lowest realm 
for our strength and sustenance. 

Now we know that anything we take pleasure 
in doing is more apt to prove beneficial than if 
we do it perfunctorily. Years ago I used to 
have the patients in my institution go out every 
morning; and I always urged them to go with 
something of interest in view, and they were 
always benefited, for they went for a purpose. 

But there was one patient to whom I forgot 
to make the suggestion, and after a few days 
she said that she always returned to the institu- 
tion very tired. I said: "What do you do when 
you go out?" and she replied, " I go three blocks 
in one direction and three in another." She 
had done that each day, and failing to derive 
any pleasure from her monotonous exercise she 
had received no benefit. 



The Spirit of Praise 177 

So it is with everything in life. It all depends 
upon the way we do a thing, the way we think 
about it. If we could only see it, the tonic does 
not come from the physical exercise alone, and 
even the extraction of certain properties from 
the food we eat depends upon the condition of 
mind. Many will eat the most nourishing food 
and fail to derive any benefit from it. You may 
pay all the attention you like to your food, out 
you will never build up your bodies till your 
minds are thoroughly poised. 

Of course in the case of people who live en- 
tirely on the physical plane there may be the 
manifestation of perfect physical health, such as 
is the case with most savages. It all depends 
upon whether we are living up to our light. 

If one is conscious only of his most exterior 
self, and is true to his physical instincts, he may 
be a healthy animal, but if he has awakened to 
a higher plane of life and yet refuses to abide by 
its instincts, preferring to look to the lower plane 
for his support, then there is going to be 
trouble. 

The people who stand, as it were, between 
the two realms — the outer and the inner — those 
who believe to a certain extent in God and yet 
will not feed upon His word, certainly can never 
be well nourished. They may say prayers to 
God, but they really pin their faith to matter. 



178 The Will to be Well 

They could not possibly say with the Psalmist; 
"Who healeth all thy diseases — Who satisfieth 
thy mouth with good things," for to them med- 
icines heal and food satisfies. They are mate- 
rialists pure and simple. It is a waste of time 
for such people to say prayers and go through 
the various forms of religious life, for by their 
acts they give the lie to their religion. 

You may think I speak very strongly on this 
subject, and it may seem that I am taking a very 
dogmatic position, but it is the result of years of 
thought and experience. For a long period I 
had devoted myself to the subject of food and 
derived r.o good from it. Just so soon, however, 
as I put my faith in other things and forgot the 
body (in the sense of centering my care upon 
it), it became well and strong and has remained 
so ever since. 

We must deal with our real selves — the word 
of God, in the most interior sense — and then will 
"health spring forth speedily." In the last 
analysis the secret of life is self-reliance ; that is, 
faith in the love-nature within. All history and 
experience go to teach us that we must be true 
to ourselves; we must respond to the deepest 
instincts of life, and allow the light within to 
illumine our thoughts, our words, and our deeds. 
This is what is meant by pleasing ourselves. 
The world we can not please, however hard we 



7 he Spirit of Praise 179 

try, and it is the walking by another's light that 
has impoverished both ourselves and the world. 

Fear and laziness account largely for the mul- 
titudes of spiritual parasites. Men refuse to obey 
the Word that speaks from within, either because 
they fear the criticism of their fellows or else be- 
cause they are too lazy to digest and assimilate 
it for themselves. In these busy days it is so 
much easier to take our food all ready prepared 
as we find it set forth in some system of religion. 

But salvation is apprehending the life within 
and revealing it faithfully in all our activities, not 
the acceptance of some man or creed. The 
physical blood shed nineteen hundred years ago 
can save no one, but it is the spirit of life which 
animated Jesus that will give us health, grace, 
and strength. 

So we come back to the basic principle of life 
once more, and say again — for it can not be said 
too often — that if we control ourselves in love 
all things literally will be ours. It is the inward 
desire which effects all outward expression. To 
feed on love, to control ourselves according to 
its behest, is to achieve outward control in mind 
and body and to be nourished abundantly. 

When we know for a surety the satisfying na- 
ture of love, not because some one else has told 
us, but because we have tasted and seen that the 
Lord is good, then we can not help exclaiming: 



180 The Will to be Well 

" Bless the Lord, O my soul, and all that is within 
me, bless His holy name. * * * Who healeth 
all thy diseases. * * * Who satisfieth thy 
mouth with good things/' Then it is that we 
rejoice alway, rinding good in all things and 
beauty everywhere. The thought is finely ex- 
pressed in the words: "All goes to show that 
the soul of man is not an organ, but animates 
and exercises all organs; is not a function like 
the power of memory, of calculation, of compari- 
son, but uses these as hands and feet; is not a 
faculty, but a light; is not the intellect or the 
will, but the master of the intellect and the will. 

"From within or from behind a light shines 
through us upon things and makes us aware that 
we are nothing, but the light is all. 

"A man is the facade of a temple wherein all 
wisdom and all good reside. What we com- 
monly call man, the eating, drinking, planting, 
counting man, does not, as we know him, repre- 
sent himself, but misrepresents himself. Him we 
do not respect, but the soul, whose organ he is, 
would he let it appear through his action, would 
make our knees bend. * * * All reform aims, 
in some one particular, to let the great soul have 
its way through us ; in other words, to engage 
us to obey." 



THE KINGDOM OF MAN 

"It is not what a man gets, but what a man is, that he 
should think of." _ HENRY Ward Beechhk 

"Every man has in himself a continent of undiscovered 
character. Happy is he who acts the Columbus to his own soul." 

— Sir J. Stephen. 

44 The kingdom that I seek 

Is Thine, so let the way 

That leads to it be also Thine." ~ . 

— BONAR. 

" The end of learning is to know God." —Milton 

Jesus said on one occasion that "the son of 
man hath power on earth to forgive sins," and 
his use of the title, son of man, instead of Son of 
God, is of deep significance. This whole ques- 
tion of a kingdom and kingship is a much 
deeper and more vital one than has been sup- 
posed. In the claim put forth by Jesus that the 
son of man hath power on earth to forgive sins 
he did not refer to one particular individual, 
who, because of his having lived in bodily form 
on the earth, could arbitrarily cleanse the record 
of other earth-dwellers; but he was declaring 
the grand truth that the soul — the real man — 
could so dominate the physical and mental man, 

181 



1 82 The Will to be Well 

so rule the earthly part in love, that the sin of 
selfishness would be blotted out. 

Let us endeavor to think of heaven and earth 
as co-existing in man. Man is a unit, the men- 
tal and physical part being an expression, even 
though a very partial one, of the soul which 
dwells within. It is this outer realm of mind and 
body in which the son of man is destined to reign 
completely, and the would-be king must have 
attained power over his own outer self, his own 
mind and body must have been renewed by the 
free action of the spirit within, before he can 
hope to extend his sway throughout the great 
earth-body. God's kingdom can come only as 
man sets about administering in love his affairs 
of thought and action. 

Many people make the mistake of regarding 
the spiritual side of life as being all there is to 
religion; but if God's kingdom is ever to be 
realized on this earth of ours we must put the 
proper valuation on the material side of life, for 
religion must be practical or nothing. Our 
effort should be to see things in their true rela- 
tion. The spirit must find a channel of expres- 
sion; inner reality must become actualized in 
the outward conditions of earth; the God-man 
must be adequately expressed by the earth-man 
of mind and body. 

Now the test of life is its power to create, 



The Kingdom of Man 183 

to produce. If there are no works the spirit 
dwelling within is practically dead; it is choked 
and dormant, and the outer kingdom is in a 
state of anarchy, there being no ruling one to 
order and control. Unity, health, and harmony 
in the mind and body of man are conditioned on 
the conscious ruling of the son of man. One 
thing that hinders us from realizing our destiny 
of power is the personal will. We want to cre- 
ate in some particular way; we are prone to 
choose our path and are not willing to let the 
spirit, the impersonal will, guide us in the way. 

Everything that comes about naturally, with- 
out effort on our part, everything that comes as 
a result of an inward pressure, an intuition, is 
the leading that we should follow. When in 
seeking a larger field of usefulness we turn from 
the natural leading, then we grieve away or 
choke the spirit, driving it in upon itself, thus 
for the time being forbidding it any natural out- 
let. It is this wilfulness on our part that so 
often obstructs the coming of the kingdom; it is 
because we are not willing to obey the inner one 
that we fail to rule in the outer realms. 

It is only when the spirit is finding free ex- 
pression in our activities that we are satisfied 
with our work — not satisfied in the sense of re- 
garding it as perfect, but as being confident that 
it is that which God would have us do. 



184 The Will to be Well 

When the Son of God and the son of man — 
the impersonal love and the personal will — are 
consciously one, then there comes a sense of joy 
and freedom in our work and we are not in 
bondage to fear or doubt, but rule over our 
kingdom in gentleness and power. 

When we see something to be done, it is often 
very hard for us to be patient in regard to its 
accomplishment. In our haste we attack the 
problem before we are prepared for the work, 
and then when we fail to bring it to a successful 
conclusion, we lose patience and wonder what is 
the matter. If we could only realize it, our im- 
patience, our self-will, has been largely responsi- 
ble for the failure. We were not ready for the 
work; our energies were dissipated, and so we 
did not bring sufficient force to the task in hand. 
It is this gathering of force which tries the 
patience, and yet on it depends the success of 
any work we undertake. The eye must be 
single, the heart and mind fixed, the energy con- 
centrated, if we are to accomplish any good 
work in this world. 

We are so prone to measure a work by its 
magnitude; yet it is often the little service, the 
private or seemingly unimportant work, that 
brings the great results. Again, it often proves 
to be the case that a small number of people 
will achieve greater victory than a large army of 



The Kingdom of Man 185 

half-hearted recruits. In the case of Gideon's 
conquest of the Midianites it was a small picked 
army that won the victory; and so, in many 
other matters, it is the quality, not the quantity, 
of service that counts. 

To have one main object in view, to bend all 
our energies to its accomplishment, and yet to 
work in a spirit of patience, is most difficult and 
yet most necessary if we would win the victory. 

If we see clearly what we wish to do, then 
everything else will contribute toward that end. 
Even things that may seem like side issues can 
be made to play a part in the final accomplish- 
ment, if we only keep the eye single. Every 
little break that occurs because of some other 
work that calls for our attention, may, if our eye 
be single to the one great work, serve in some 
way to further the cause, if in no other way than 
by developing new power in us. 

It is the height of foolishness to think that 
there can be spiritual development without a 
corresponding expression. Living faith will 
always result in living works. The feeling of 
peace, joy, faith, existing apart from works, is of 
no avail, for faith begins to decline, to die out, 
when there is no outlet for it in works. If we 
refuse to give outward expression to our faith, 
doubt will enter the mind, a deadness will creep 
over us, and joy depart. 



1 86 The Will to be Well 

If we allow doubt of our own ability to enter the 
mind, if we doubt the sincerity or ability of the 
people with whom we have to deal, if we doubt 
the principle with which we are working, then 
we become weak and powerless; and we all 
know that it is only a step from weakness to 
disease. 

Let us, then, cultivate faith, let us open the 
eyes of our hearts to love, let us see the heavenly 
vision, and let it shine through us upon the 
earth ; for so only can man come into his king- 
dom, so only can he realize his destiny of power 
and beauty. We can not overestimate the neces- 
sity of faith. There is no evidence in history 
that the doubting man ever left anything behind 
as an evidence of his having lived, except his 
doubts. 

Many people mistake faith for credulity or a 
mere blind acceptance of another's opinion ; but 
it is a very different matter. Faith is spiritual 
sight, or, better still, it is a vital touch. It is a 
living contact with the great Heart of love, and 
such a condition will always eventuate in works 
of love. To be in touch with the Creator is to 
be endued with His power, and we know He 
who builded the mountains can also remove 
them. If we have faith as a grain of mustard 
seed, if we are genuinely in touch with creative 
power, we can actually change the face of the 



The Kingdom of Man 187 

earth; we can remove mountains, we can make 
man's kingdom — chaotic, diseased, imperfect 
though it may now appear — to become God's 
kingdom of peace, power, and beauty. 

It is our false concept of the separation be- 
tween man and God that has so sadly hindered 
us in attaining our kingdom. We limit the 
power of God when we say that man can only 
control his mind and body, that there is a limit 
to his dominion, for the Power that formed the 
world and created the elements can also reform 
and recreate. The life in man is God-life, and 
it is as infinite in power as God Himself. The 
same Power that creates can also control and 
direct. Jesus commanded, and the waves obeyed 
him. 

When we come to see that life is one, that 
there really is no separation between the phys- 
ical, mental, and spiritual planes of being, and 
that the God-life can not be divided and meas- 
ured off into separate parts, then will we begin 
at least to inherit the kingdom which has always 
been awaiting our rule. We come at last to 
realize that it is one Power that flows in and 
through all, one Intelligence that controls all 
things, one Life that animates. 

We err when we look upon the energy which 
throbs through us as being separate from the 
universal force. It is the carnal mind that re- 



1 88 The Will to be Well 

gards man as a separate and powerless being; 
and sin, disease, and death will not be overcome 
until all men attain unto the Christ mind — that 
of conscious oneness with the Father. 

Whenever this thought of complete dominion 
in the outer world is touched upon, people are 
apt to say, "Oh, yes, that is to be ultimately, 
but it is a long way off!" It is because we take 
this attitude in regard to it that it remains in the 
future. The world needs more than anything 
else seers who realize that power, limitless power, 
is ours here and now. Now is the accepted time 
if we will only heartily accept it as such. 

We hesitate to go forward because we feel our 
inadequacy; yet strength and wisdom, power 
and fulness, can only come as we use what we 
have here and now. Man's province is to trans- 
form the whole outer kingdom so that order and 
beauty, health and wholeness, will reign every- 
where; and this will be accomplished only as 
we use the degree of power we now possess. 

The question for us is : Do we will to do the 
will of God ? If we will to be well, to be whole, 
if we determine earnestly that the spirit within 
shall find free expression in mind, body, and out- 
ward acts, then will we surely come into our in- 
heritance of power. 

When we arrive at a true consciousness of the 
law of evolution then will we become creators 



The Kingdom of Man 



189 



with the Father. When we see that it is the 
desire to adjust one's self to one's environment 
that has called forth new forms of life, evolved 
new organs, and endued with new power, then 
will we go forward in good heart, trusting the 
One who has stirred us into activity to guide us 
in the Way of Life. So shall man come into his 
kingdom and so shall heaven be realized on 
earth. 




THE DAWN OF A NEW AGE 

"It is safe to affirm that there are no new revelations. 
The same Word that ordained light never ceases so to ordain; 
the same Spirit that moved and operated upon the waters at 
the genesis, is potent and active to-day. The world may vary 
in form and aspect, but that which gives it life is always the 
same. Whoever will ascend above the changing scenes will 
know and mirror in himself the unchanging. This is what is 
meant by being involved and included in the divine aura of 

Ig t# — Alexander Wilder. 

"All are bigots who limit the Divine within the boundaries 
of their present knowledge." _ M argaret Fuller. 

"As we recognize the divine law of human growth, and 
the inherent power that is lodged in the ideal man, we may 
wield them in proportion to our conformity to the universal 
order. 

"The law works within. The new heavens and new earth, 
which are promised, are to come through a change, not in 
them, but in ourselves. Our eyes are to be adjusted to what 

alread y is -" -Henry Wood. 

"That which hath been is now, and that which 
is to be hath already been and God requireth the 
things of the past." So said the wise man of 
ancient times. What did he mean by this — 
"That which hath been is now and that which 
is to be hath already been?" What was the 
meaning? We find that Solomon knew some 
things that it took Science thousands of years 

190 



The Dawn of a New Age 191 

afterward to find out. He said: "The rivers 
run into the sea, but the sea is not filled;" and 
" From whence the rivers come thither they re- 
turn again." 

What is the meaning of these statements? 
They mean that the laws of God are eternal and 
unchanging; that that which occurs at one time 
in the history of God's great universe, under the 
same laws will occur again. Creation did not 
begin and end at any stated time. Creation is 
an eternal process without beginning and with- 
out ending. 

Wise men have told us that there are cycles of 
time; that certain things occurred on one great 
cycle and other things on another. In the pro- 
cess of time the different races, through repeated 
reincarnations, were ready to pass out of one 
plane into a higher plane. But did that end the 
world? No; the world might be purified and 
renewed, but that purification was to fit the earth 
again for another race of people who go through 
the same things, think the same things, and do 
the same things that we are doing to-day. It 
is said that two more races are yet to come be- 
fore the present cycle of time is completed, and 
with the seventh and last race will come an age 
known as the " Golden Age." 

Plato and other wise men of his time had 
knowledge in all probability derived from the 



i 9 2 The Will to be Well 

records in Egypt that were afterward destroyed. 
They had knowledge of a continent which ex- 
isted ages ago, where people of a very high order 
lived. It is said that this continent disappeared 
one night with all the people; that this race cor- 
responded to what we speak of as the seventh 
race, the people of which were far more highly 
developed than any people that live on this 
planet at the present time. In the Bible there is 
just the slightest intimation of a race superior to 
that inhabiting the earth in very early Bible 
times. 

Whether this is true or not, we are in the 
springtime of a new age. We can not tell yet 
what the harvest from this age is going to be, 
but we do know that wonderful changes are 
taking place in the minds of people. The last 
age was, without doubt, the most materialistic 
age that the world has ever passed through, and 
in this particular age — this last age — people have 
sought to find the solution of all the problems of 
life, not in the spiritual or mental realm, but in 
the material realm. It is believed by many 
scientists that the whole solution of life is going 
to be found in the material universe. 

Science has gone just as far as it is able to, 
and what is the result of all scientific investi- 
gation ? In some respects the results are very 
good, and in other respects the results are very 



The Dawn of a New Age 193 

disappointing. Beginning with the thought that 
the solution of life was to be found in matter, 
they have not explained at any point or at any 
time anything about life. They have begun with 
the protoplasm and gone on up showing how all 
the different changes have taken place — how one 
form met another form and how each one was 
completed. Science has been dealing with form 
all the time, but it has not told us the first thing 
about the life-principle which enters into the 
physical organism of man at birth and leaves at 
death. Science, as it exists at the present time, 
is simply a science of form. Form has its pur- 
pose; form is the outer symbol; it is the outer 
world and it remains for a new science to inter- 
pret that outer world, and that will be the science 
of spirit. 

Wherever there is excessive action in any di- 
rection it is always followed by just as excessive 
reaction; and when a pendulum has swung just 
so far over the materialistic side of life, it then 
swings just as far back in the other direction. 
Therefore, many people to-day have certain 
beliefs in regard to spiritual or psychic matters 
which sometime they will have to change, be- 
cause they are just as far from the truth as is 
the materialistic view. We find people taking 
a radical position in regard to some things which 
is neither reasonable nor true. It is far from 



i 9 4 The Will to be Well 

reasonable for people to say that there is no 
material universe and that they have no phys- 
ical bodies. It is not reasonable and it is not 
true when people deny the reality of sin and 
disease. All these things will have to be mod- 
ified in the law of future knowledge. It is true 
that the spirit of man is the controlling part of 
man's being. It has been taught for ages, but 
only within comparatively few years have many 
accepted it. The body has meant far more than 
the mind or the soul, but now in the springtime of 
a new age the spirit of man will mean far more 
than the body. 

What do the farmers do in the springtime? 
First, they clear away everything that will ob- 
struct the plowing and harrowing of the ground, 
and the planting of the seed; then it is ready for 
Nature to act upon it. Then comes the growth. 
You can not tell at first, when the little blades 
come up through the ground, as to what the 
harvest is going to be — whether you are going 
to have fruit, or wheat, or tares. 

All these preparations are necessary before 
one can realize any harvest; and it is just as 
necessary to make the conditions of the spring- 
time of a new age such that there will be the 
right harvest later as it is for the farmer to pre- 
pare the ground. 

In what way are we going to prepare the 



The Dawn of a New Age 195 

ground for the new age? Some will do it by 
trying to carry all the preconceived ideas and 
thoughts of the past into the present. Some 
will hold on to their old prejudices, and some 
will hold on to their old forms, but let me tell 
you that in the change of these cycles of time it 
is not so much the question of time as the ques- 
tion of conditions. 

In God's field of life we all help to sow the 
seed and gather the harvest, but in some cases 
the seed falls by the wayside and the fowls eat it 
up ; and sometimes among the stones, and there 
being no depth of earth, when it springs up, it 
withers under the light of the sun and passes 
away ; and again it falls among the thorns and 
briers and its life is choked out. Only the good 
seed that falls on the prepared soil brings forth 
fruit of its kind. 

Our minds might be said to be the field and 
our thoughts the seed. If we are careless and 
indifferent, and if we take no thought about pre- 
paring the mind for the influx of good thought, 
then it will be with us like the seed planted by 
the wayside; but if our minds are filled with 
pride or prejudice, then will it be like the seed 
that falls among the thorns and briers; but if 
we are self-righteous and selfish, then the seed 
will fall among the stones ; but if we prepare our 
minds, trying to make them restful, trying to 



1 96 The Will to be Well 

keep them free and unbiased, and if we are 
thoughtful concerning life, and seek to know 
the true way, then comes an influx from the 
very source of being, and the mind becomes 
illuminated by love, faith, and hope. These 
beautiful qualities in life act in turn to shape 
and give color to our thoughts and our thoughts 
then become the good seed which, planted, 
brings forth in time a bountiful harvest, and 
every seed will bring forth a fruit after its kind. 

We know that the seed is growing when we 
see it expressed in kind word and deed. Kind 
word and deed are the outer expression of the 
inner seed, and if the ground has been prepared 
and the seed is good, the expression in turn will 
be good. True feelings and kind thoughts must 
always result in righteous words and noble 
deeds. 

There is an orderly sequence from beginning 
to end. The right feeling begets the right 
thinking; the right thinking begets the right 
word and deed. According to the eternal law 
of God, we can only reap that which we have 
sown, and if we have not sown kind thoughts 
for others we can not reap kind thoughts from 
others. If we have sown the seed of the tares 
in a spirit of anger, malice, or hatred, we reap 
the harvest that they produce just as unfailingly 
as we reap a harvest of the good seed. What 



The Dawn of a New Age 197 

we do to men in turn they do to us. Each in- 
dividual makes for himself an environment. It 
is not made for him, but he makes it for himself; 
that is, he has the power to relate himself to 
people and his surroundings in a way that will 
be thoroughly beneficial both to himself and 
others, or he has the power, to some degree, to 
disregard the laws of life and make for himself 
an environment both with evil and unrest. 

In this new springtime of life it is essential for 
our well-being and happiness that we start right. 
Let us know that every quality in us is calling 
to the same quality in some one else. That if it 
is a good quality it will awaken the same good 
in another. In feeling it and living it one helps 
to bring it into existence in other lives so that 
the good going out from one acts upon another 
and again reacts back to the one who gave it 
out, and in the same way does an evil quality 
act. "Curses like chickens come home to roost." 
The curses one bestows upon another are in the 
end returned unto himself with interest. 

How careful, then, we should be in preparing 
the ground for the reception of the seed, and 
then plant the seed that will bring to us a har- 
vest — not of distress or of pain, but one of joy and 
gladness. We desire that all things good and 
beautiful may flow into our lives; then, if this is 
our desire, let its fulfilment come in our giving 



198 The Will to be Well 

out the good and the beautiful to others. No 
matter what other people think, or other people 
say or do, think right, speak right, and do right, 
and you will reap your harvest in gladness. 

Some people to-day are living in the old age 
— in the winter of the old age — and some are 
living in the springtime of the new. Remember, 
races do not appear on this earth and then van- 
ish and a new race appear, but the old race stays 
on, getting weaker and weaker, and the new gets 
stronger and stronger. The people who are 
living in the springtime of a new age will drop 
all the old ways and means and adopt the new. 
We no longer travel by stage-coaches; we travel 
in a different way. We no longer have our mails 
carried on horseback, but we have our messages 
sent all over the world by electricity and steam. 

In the New Thought we can not carry the old 
ways into the new life. It is a continual dying 
to old conditions and a living to new ones, and 
it is not that the race brings about the condition, 
but each individual brings about the condition 
for himself, and all individuals working together 
give the best results. Each of us should know 
where we stand, whether we are laying hold 
on the new or whether we are living in the 
old. If we are living in the old, we are living 
with the old form and thoughts of the world. 

Are you among the awakened ? Because to 



The Dawn of a New Age 199 

the awakened come all things new; not that 
some things are made new, but that everything 
is made new, because the new is going to bring 
out, as has never been brought out before, the 
Christ thought. The Christ thought is this: 
the spirit is the cleansing power; the flesh is of 
no profit. The body is not the man, and the 
body can never become the man. To some 
degree it represents the man, and to some degree 
expresses man's soul and mind. But the ex- 
pression is in the mind. 

The springtime of this new age shows that we 
are going to begin to use the inner power more 
than any other power. It is the age of the in- 
visible that we are living in — an age which will 
deal with the invisible forces. There are no 
forces but what are invisible. Anything which 
seems to be is only the manifestation of a force; 
but we are going to deal with the invisible forces 
as man has never dealt with them before. 

The world has accomplished more in the last 
one hundred years than it has in all this grand 
cycle which has gone before, and we are going 
to grow in the coming one hundred years more 
than we have in the past century. Already we 
have the indication of what the new age is going 
to be when we are told that in a very short time 
we are going to speak across the Atlantic just as 
we do through the telephone to our friends in 



200 The Will to be Well 

the city. It is not going to end there, for we are 
going to speak with our minds. The outer, re- 
member, follows the construction of the inner; 
you have to follow definite laws to get any re- 
sult. Remember, it is the mind that makes the 
instrument through which we talk. It is the 
mind observing certain laws which brings about 
certain results. Everything that man does is the 
result of what he has thought, but he must think 
in accord with the eternal law in order to get 
definite results. You can not get definite results 
by going contrary to the law of anything. It is 
only as you come in harmony with law that you 
do get results. 

We know that Christ did wonderful things; 
that is, we are told he did wonderful things. 
People in times past have spoken of those things 
as miracles. A miracle is supposed to be an 
occurrence which transcends the law. There 
are no occurrences which transcend law. No 
matter what Jesus did, it was done in accordance 
with the eternal law of God. What did he say? 
He said this: "To those who believe they shall 
do greater things than I have done." Believing 
is something more than what most people think 
it is. Are we going to believe that Jesus was 
right? He said he would heal the sick and that 
he would do many other things, but they were 
to be done in accord with the law. 



The Dawn of a New Age 201 

Now in the healing of the sick, I believe that 
this whole movement as yet is in its infancy. I 
believe that so far as thought-transference is con- 
cerned, it is only a question of time when all 
people will understand it and that we will be able 
to send a thought to any one in another part of 
the world and receive an answer in the same 
manner. No one can tell us what time is or 
what space is, but we are living in a great uni- 
verse wherein every part is related to every part 
One action starts another action, and this will 
go on through the great law of vibration, reach- 
ing out to all people and all things. 

When this law of vibration is understood, then 
sickness and disease will become a thing of the 
past. When we vibrate in a harmonious way, 
mentally and physically, then discord and disease 
will go out of the life. I believe in this next age 
that man will rule the elements about him. He 
will rule the elements through studying his own 
nature. If we study the life of Christ we will 
see that he studied control all through life. He 
said there was a power working within him, that 
belonged not to the personal man; that it was a 
universal power, and through this he controlled 
the conditions within and without him. 

Now, if this power is the universal power that 
we believe it is, then this universal power acting 
through the individual can bring about wonder- 



202 The Will to be Well 

ful results — wonderful results in every way. I 
believe that in this coming age life will be 
greatly prolonged. I do not believe, as some 
do, that we will retain these physical organisms 
forever. I do not believe that this is in the plan 
of life. When this lesson of life is learned we 
will not want this organism somewhere else ; we 
will have an organism fitted for wherever we go. 
The body will correspond to the plane to which 
it belongs. 

I believe this universe was made for man, not 
man for the universe. I do not believe that a 
time will come when we will know all that there 
is to be known, because then happiness, desire, 
and hope would cease. I do not believe that we 
will ever attain to a heaven where we will play 
on golden harps all the time, or rest eternally. 
I do not think we will have any such eternity. 
I believe that we will have an eternity in which 
we can always do something. This, I believe, 
will bring us more happiness than getting into a 
place where everything seems to stand still. 

We talk about perfection, but what do we 
really know about it ? It is only a relative term 
at best. The seed is perfect and the tree is per- 
fect and the fruit is perfect. We can not tell 
where perfection begins or where it ends. The 
seed, the tree, the fruit may be perfect in so far 
as it has progressed. But we can not affirm an 



The Dawn of a New Age 203 

ultimate perfection, because we do not know 
anything about perfection. 

This world is not a dead, inanimate thing, but 
it has a mind; and the great mind of the world 
is a history of what every individual has thought. 
By noting the things that have occurred in the 
past, we can see what is likely to occur in the 
future. Solomon was right when he said that 
God requireth the things of the past; yet the 
things that are occurring now will occur in the 
ages to come, but we will not be here to see 
them. We will have progressed, however, to a 
far higher plane of development than we can 
conceive of at the present time. 

It is only as each individual responds and 
unfolds to his inner powers and possibilities 
that he can know aught, in a sense, of that 
which awaits him. We must know that the 
light that is shining in the darkness — shining 
even in our mental darkness — is to enlighten 
every man which cometh into the world. That 
light is in every soul now and is only awaiting 
a recognition on the part of the mind of man. 
When that recognition comes it will become a 
living flame, and then instead of living in the 
individual life we will live in the universal life ; 
instead of being guided by the human will we 
will come under the divine will. Then will our 
will become one with God's, and everything will 



204 The Will to be Well 

be changed. We will have passed from the old 
conditions of life and we will have entered into 
the new. There will not be a particle of the old 
life left — the old life that depended upon the 
things of the material. We will live in the life 
of the spirit, the spirit which quickeneth, the 
spirit which brings with it the knowledge of 
eternal life. "To know God is eternal life." We 
are all to know God. When we know God in 
the spirit, when we know Him in our own lives, 
and we know Him in truth, then the old thought 
of life will be changed and we will be living in a 
new age, in reality, and we will know what that 
new age means. 

We are coming into the beautiful springtime 
of a new age, and with this springtime will come 
the changes from sickness and disease and 
death. I say death, because we shall not all 
sleep, we shall not all go through the changes 
that the world has been going through in the 
past. The last enemy to overcome is death, 
and man will overcome that enemy. Paul says: 
" We will not all sleep ; we will all be changed 
in the twinkling of an eye." It will not be 
through old age, but through the power of the 
mind and the spirit that we will lay down the 
body, when the mind and the spirit have no 
further use for it, as that is what Jesus meant 
when he said that they might destroy the temple, 




The Dawn of a New Age 205 

but in three days he would again build it up. 
The /was in the temple, the /was in the body, 
the / was the real man, and the real man has 
built the temple, and the real man can destroy 
the temple if he chooses, and the real man will 
build it again, and will build it strong and whole 
in every respect, and will make it a fit house 
where souls may dwell. Many have this power 
now, and if they have it to some degree they 
can have it to the full degree. This is the de- 
mand that is made on each and every individual, 
and this demand will grow greater and greater 
as the years go by. 

This is the cry of the new age — that we shall 
have strong and whole bodies, that we shall 
preach the real Christ gospel, which is a gospel 
of glad tidings, and hasten the time when all 
shall know God from the least unto the great- 
est. 



THE CONTROLLED LIFE 

"As God lives by His own will, and we live in Him, so 
has He given us power to will in ourselves. How much 
better should we not fare if, finding that we have no 
feeble inclination to seek the source of our life, we 
should yet will upward toward God, rousing that es- 
sence of life in us which He has given us from His 
own heart, to call again upon Him who is our life, 
who can fill the emptiest heart, rouse the deadest con- 
science, quicken the dullest feeling, and strengthen the 
feeblest will." — George MacDonald. 

When we use the term self-control, we 
should have in mind its application to the 
whole being; not partial control or control of 
a part of the self — the spiritual, the intellec- 
tual or the physical only. These are all so re- 
lated that there can be no separation. Even 
at death there is no real parting. The husk 
passes, but all that is real remains. We lose 
a certain grossness, but we have still a body. 
Wherever there is an innermost there must 
always be an outermost also. We speak of 
disembodied spirits, but there is in reality no 
such thing as a soul without a body. There 
may be no body that is visible to the physical 
eye, but there is an expression, a form, never- 
theless. We may conceive of the universe 
206 



The Controlled Life 



207 



even as the body of God. There is very much 
in this world that the physical eye can not see. 
There are whole octaves of sound, the exist- 
ence of which can be demonstrated in vibra- 
tions, that the ear is incapable of recognizing. 
Despite all the artificial aids that we bring to 
our assistance — the telescope, the microscope, 
the spectroscope — there is still a very consid- 
erable undiscovered country awaiting our 
cognizance. If our ears were more finely 
attuned we could hear the sap rising, the 
grass growing, the fly walking; we could 
see not seven colors only, but seventy times 
seven in tones and shades and variations of 
these. It is so also when we think. But the 
time will come when the people who have 
made the world — that is, we, ourselves — you 
and I and all who have lived — we have all car- 
ried on the creation of the world in some meas- 
ure — we will know eventually all about it. 
How? By knowing ourselves; through self- 
knowledge and self-control. There is nothing 
in the outer world, as we call it, that has not 
its counterpart — its prototype — in the soul of 
man. With the development of the inner, the 
vision of life will continually widen. We are 
the creators of this world, and presently we 
will realize it. The mind of man can change 
the face of the earth. Take the few concrete 



208 The Will to be Well 

instances that have come within our own no- 
tice during the last decade or two. Not so 
very long ago the greater part of Southern 
California was little more than a waste of sand 
and sage-brush where now are acres of lemon 
and orange groves. We all know, too, of the 
new fruits and flowers that are the result of 
Professor Burbank's careful experimenting. 
Much of the change and development, how- 
ever, that is going on all about us we are not 
conscious of — even when we ourselves are 
instrumental in bringing it about. Mankind 
is the principal factor in all evolution as well 
as in all the occurrences in the physical world 
— cyclones, pestilences, famines, wars. All 
have their correspondences in the mind of man, 
and the time will come when man will be con- 
sciously master of all these things. Baron 
Munchausen's writings are insipid compared 
to the recorded facts of the last fifty or 
seventy-five years, and yet it is none the less 
true that man " discovers " in the material 
world only as he himself unfolds to his own 
consciousness. Something more than ninety per 
cent., I believe, of electrical force is wasted 
now. About nine times as much energy is used 
in running a car or a machine as is really 
needed. Presently we will learn how to utilize 
this surplus, and then with the same electrical 



The Controlled Life 



209 



current we can accomplish nine times as much. 
There is practically no limit to the energy 
locked up, one may say, in ourselves. The 
great problem of life to-day is how to con- 
serve — to economize — energy. It is because 
of our inability to do this that there are so 
many nervous, illy poised, feeble people in the 
world. Of course, in one sense, no energy 
can be lost, but it is lost to us if we can not 
control or rightly use it. Nothing that is real 
can ever become lessened by use, but the abuse 
of anything limits the possibilities in the use 
of that thing. We all know what it is to feel 
weak and exhausted at one time and strong 
and virile at another. Now there is a reason 
for this, and it behooves us to inquire into it. 
Let us go to the heart of things — there is little 
accomplished in dalliance in the superficiali- 
ties. The causes of all these things are to be 
found in man's inmost life — the vital center, 
that is deeper than subconsciousness. Far 
back in the beginning of things, among the 
earliest forms of life when there were no 
brain cells and no organs — or, at least, nothing 
corresponding to what we mean by these 
terms to-day — there was yet what we may call 
feeling. When there was a need of food it 
was found, approached, and organs for its ap- 
propriation and assimilation improvised, as it 



2io The Will to be Well 

were, for the occasion. At first these would 
disappear, as the need of them passed, to be 
recalled, reimprovised again, upon a recur- 
ring need. Then Nature, always economical 
of her forces and materials, decided, so to 
speak, that it w T ould require less energy to 
make permanent organs to meet these recur- 
ring needs, and thus the various specialized 
members, the mouth, the eyes, etc., came into 
being. The center seems always to have 
known the needs of the circumference, and the 
instinct of the lower becomes the intuition of 
the higher forms. Now it is the recognition 
of this center in ourselves — call it what we 
please, God, love, cosmic energy, primal force 
— that gives us poise, makes us masters in- 
stead of slaves, and puts us at once in complete 
control of ourselves and our world. This is the 
vantage-ground of true self-control. No man 
can become so evil that he wholly loses the 
key to this center — this " secret place of the 
Most High." The kernel of truth in the doc- 
trine of predestination is this: that law is ab- 
solute, that there can be no exceptions to the 
eternal laws of the universe ; but we know now 
that these laws are only those of life and of 
love. " That which hath been is now, and that 
which is to be hath already been and God re- 
quireth the things of the past." Though this en- 



The Controlled Life 



211 



ergy at the center of things is imperishable and 
incapable of waste, on the mental plane there 
are many ways in which its use may be re- 
tarded, and through abuse it may be dissipated, 
and the man in every external expression may 
therefore lack poise and ease, self-control and 
development. The mind becomes absorbed in 
the outermost things, and fails to distinguish 
the real from the seeming. The innermost be- 
comes obscured, as the clouds hide the sun. 
We say of a person in this condition that he 
is evil, that God has gone out of his life. Now 
this is not true; it could never be true, any 
more than that the sun has gone from the 
world when the skies are gray. It is on this 
innermost plane that the whole direction of the 
life takes place, not through the operation of 
hygenic laws or chemical forces, creeds, or any 
effort at superficial control. We are coming 
more and more to see that the whole sum and 
substance of religion is simply love and serv- 
ice. Self-control has to do with the mind of 
man only — that is to say, there is no lack of 
poise or waste of forces at the center; it is 
only on the mental plane that these forces are 
perverted. If we would only let this central 
power express itself throughout the being, in 
every outermost detail and activity, then the 
oneness of life and of spirit of which we speak 



212 The Will to be Well 

would at once be actualized — realized. Tyn- 
dall said, " No matter where you begin in your 
study of life — of the universe — sooner or later 
you get back to the sun," and so must every- 
thing go back to God, for everything in the 
universe is God. I do not mean that the part 
— any part — is God ; but the individual is one 
with God as the ray is of the sun — has no ex- 
istence apart from God. There is a funda- 
mental difference between saying, " I and the 
Father are one," and saying, " I am God." The 
latter, Christ never said. When the fulness of 
power and life at the heart of the universe pos- 
sesses us and acts through us we are not that 
power, but we are filled with it, so that we have 
no life nor activity apart from it. 

The effort — the constant, unwearying effort 
— of all life is to realize at each point, at each 
moment, outwardly, what is at the innermost 
center. Self-control does not mean restraint 
and restriction and the coercion of ourselves in 
externals, but the glad, whole-hearted subjec- 
tion of the perceptions — the outermost — to the 
sway and full current of the innermost. This 
is the secret of true self-control; this is the 
" Secret place of the Most High," where the 
whole being is kept in " perfect peace." Cen- 
tered here, one's impulses gradually grow 
healthful ; whatever one eats, or does, or desires 



The Co?itr oiled Life 213 

to do will then be what is best for the stage 
of development at which one is at the moment. 
We can all recall enjoying a certain thing at 
one time and feeling a repugnance toward it at 
another. This, if we are living from the cen- 
ter, simply and sincerely, is not due to superfi- 
cial moods, but to the fact that our needs vary, 
and the gratification of them is guided from 
within. Eventually every outward desire and 
resulting condition will respond perfectly to 
the inner requirement. Every real thing, you 
know, has its contradiction — its opposite. 
This is for the purpose of bringing the truth 
into greater prominence and clearer under- 
standing. And when once we come to under- 
stand the meaning of evil in this light it will 
cease to have its present power over us, as we 
have long ago ceased to be frightened by 
shadows. Remember, " all things are ours " 
now — health and happiness and this world's 
goods and the " unspeakable riches " of the 
inner life. But only as we come to realize the 
Kingdom of Heaven within us do we come 
into any real possession of its outer counter- 
parts. When we lose sight of the inner and 
seek simply the- outer symbols, they forever 
elude us, or if we grasp them, they turn to 
ashes in our hands and we are still unsatisfied. 
When in our hearts there is anything in the 



214 The Will to be Well 

nature of envy, jealousy, or unkindness there 
will be unrest and discord in the outer life. If 
we are not satisfied with life — our lives — as we 
find them to-day — and which of us can say 
that he is? — then it is for us to begin to build 
the new heaven and the new earth of our de- 
sire. If it was possible for Jesus to find within, 
and establish without, this Kingdom of God, 
then is it not only possible for, but incumbent 
upon, us? " Greater things than these shall ye 
do, because I go unto my Father." That is all 
we are here in the world for, to bring with us, 
by degrees, the Kingdom of Heaven. We are 
not here for the accumulation of riches, or 
power, or any other thing. St. Paul says: 
" When that which is perfect is come into the 
life, then that which is partial will pass away." 
Once the realization of the indwelling riches is 
ours we will no longer desire anything that is 
not simply and naturally the result of this in- 
nermost. Everything in life, our daily work, 
the demands upon the business man at his 
desk or the house-mother in her home, may 
not only be made to serve this great life pur- 
pose, but may be, word by word, action by 
action, the exponent, the revealing, of this 
very Kingdom. 

Notice, too, that we waste our forces when 
we accord to anything any more effort than 



The Controlled Life 215 

its accomplishment requires. If in addressing 
an audience I were to fill the room with my 
voice and constantly gesticulate forcibly, in- 
stead of merely speaking with sufficient 
strength to be heard distinctly, giving expres- 
sion to no muscular action that is not a fun- 
damental necessity in the presentation of my 
ideas, I doubt if I would thereby reach a single 
mentality that could not have been as readily 
impressed in the other way. The highest 
form of oratory is " the speech of soul with 
soul," and the nearer we approach that, the 
more lasting will be the impress our words 
will leave. As a matter of fact, it has often 
been a question with me as to just what ex- 
tent we should, in considering the highest 
good of our hearers, simplify and explain our 
meaning, either by gesture, or coloring of tone, 
or elaborate illustration. Unless a listener 
can meet the speaker half way, as it were, it 
often seems an aggression and an intrusion to 
pursue him, so to speak, with our message. 
Every word, every tone, every action, should 
mean something — should be instinct with the 
ideal, the vital message of the soul. Then 
every word and deed would live, would be as 
natural, as life-giving, as our breathing; there 
would be no waste of forces, for every effort 
would bring its own renewing. 



216 The Will to be Well 

As long as our lives are controlled by our 
mentalities, there will inevitably be differences 
and dissentions and discords. As a matter of 
fact, there has been more intellectual cruelty in 
the world than physical cruelty, even appal- 
ling as this latter is throughout our history. 
A purely intellectual man, a heartless man, is 
capable of more cruelty than the veriest brute. 
It is because our concept of religion was so 
long largely an intellectual one that there have 
been so many martyrs and such suffering of 
all kinds inflicted in its name. Calvin con- 
sented to the burning of his friend at the stake 
because he differed from him in a point of be- 
lief. It is only when we get beneath all men- 
tal differences that we reach the plane of unity, 
of the true and everlasting oneness. 

Self-control is the control of all the lesser 
by this greater. In true self-control there is 
no effort, no restraint. And the end of all 
creation is that the will of each — the whole 
being of each — shall come into subjection to 
the Universal will, which is the Law of Love — 
come consciously, voluntarily, because of all- 
compelling desire, the true homesickness of 
the soul for its own. 

When we dwell exclusively in the external 
we lose our poise, we go to extremes, and the 



The Controlled Life 



217 



inevitable result is a morbid dissatisfaction 
with life, a satiety that is like a living death. 

To the healthy mind the world is so full of 
varied interests that it would seem impossible 
to reach a point in life where these interests no 
longer existed. There are so many things in 
the world that claim our attention that the 
average lifetime seems all too short to permit 
of our entering into, enjoying, or understand- 
ing their merest beginnings. And yet it is 
not uncommon to find people who, before 
they have reached the meridian of life, have 
exhausted all ability to enjoy, and for whom 
life holds no further sensation. In their mad 
pursuit of pleasure, gratification, or experience 
they had satisfied every longing, had glutted 
up every natural desire, until desire itself be- 
came stifled and dead. And there is no phys- 
ical suffering, no mental yearning, however 
poignant, that can equal the dead, numb, un- 
fathomable misery of satiety. Mental longing, 
by the very strength of its desire, will work 
out of the darkness and into the light. After 
physical suffering comes a relief and enjoy- 
ment as great as the suffering itself ; but to the 
person sated with every pleasure there is no 
relief, unless, indeed, he seek it in the things 
which he had hitherto fled from — forgetfulness 
of self, duty, and love. 



218 The Will to be Well 

A few months ago I met a man who 
was only a little over forty years of age, and 
yet he had lived to such an excess that he 
looked, and I believe felt, quite sixty. The 
world held nothing for him ; he had gratified 
every sense appetite, had sipped the sweetness 
of all things in life, and had given nothing out ; 
he was a scholar as well as a business man ; 
he had traveled in many countries, had known 
many phases of life, and yet at the age of forty 
he had reached a point where everything in 
life was dull, tasteless, and vapid. Everything 
to him was vanity and vexation of spirit. 
Nature had given him a splendid constitution, 
but he had ignored the gift, and went reckless- 
ly on until at an early age he was suffering 
the infirmities and aches which should nat- 
urally not have come to him until he had 
doubled that many years, and not even then, 
if life had been rightly lived. The knowledge 
he had acquired through study and travel 
played no real part in his life, because of a 
mind so self-centered that he could think and 
talk of nothing except himself, the things he 
ate or drank, the hours he slept, the games 
he played at his club. His universe revolved 
about himself. He was the center, and nat- 
urally it made him a bit dizzy, as is the case 
with all self-centered people. If we should 



The Controlled Life 219 

analyze a life of this kind we would find that in 
early youth extreme selfishness must have 
been allowed to take root, and that nothing 
short of the gratification of every personal de- 
sire would bring any degree of contentment, 
and that the one impulse uppermost in the 
mind was how to get pleasure and happiness, 
with never a thought of giving. The result of 
this plan for securing happiness is only un- 
rest and dissatisfaction, because it is impos- 
sible for any one to get happiness in life for 
any continued length of time without giving 
happiness. It is not, therefore, the number 
of years one lives that brings satiety, but it 
may come at any age to those who, through 
their failure to give out happiness, shut off the 
source of supply. Happiness, real happiness, 
is made up of a continual giving and receiving, 
and when the giving ceases, so also must the 
receiving, as it can not flow through a blocked 
channel. If we look out on life with colored 
glasses we can not see the beauty and the 
sunshine, but, instead, the shadow and gloom 
which our point of view creates. No matter 
what our view-point is, the fact remains that 
the sun does shine brightly, that the birds 
sing joyously, and that life contains, although 
in a different way, as much joy and happiness 
for the old as for the young, if the shadow of 



220 The Will to be Well 

selfishness be not allowed to come Detween 
them and the living light. He who lives for 
himself must die; die to everything but him- 
self; die to the friendship that is offered 
him. Die to the beauty of the great external 
world; die to the very joy of living. And it 
is not because all these fair conditions do not 
exist, but because of his failure to partake of 
them in their proper measure, and to help oth- 
ers to learn how to live. 

Dying is a lessening of life, living is an ever- 
increasing life, and an ever-increasing life 
must come through our own helpful efforts to 
benefit others. This is true of every depart- 
ment of life. It is just as true of the religious 
life as it is of any other phase — that all true re- 
ceiving must come through our righteous giv- 
ing. If we are acquiring knowledge concern- 
ing the more advanced things of life solely for 
our own ends and purposes, it is only a ques- 
tion of time when satiety will come to us, be- 
cause through the failure to give again the sup- 
ply will be cut off, and not only this, but the 
spirit and the desire for that knowledge with 
which we have been possessed will also have 
departed, because the spirit will only live 
where there is action, and there is or can be 
no real action where there is not giving out 
as well as taking in. 



The Controlled Life 221 

To people who are continually longing and 
wanting something, let me say that there is no 
quicker way of having these wants satisfied 
than by trying to help some one else. We do 
not need to roam the world up and down in 
quest of greater knowledge, but we should 
make the knowledge of which we are pos- 
sessed — wisdom, and the wise one is always 
the one who seeks to benefit the lives of others 
through what he himself knows. 

Let us remember, then, first of all, that 
satiety comes to every one, soon or late, who 
shuts ofif the source of supply, and that the 
source of supply can only be kept open through 
aiding and giving. By this process life itself 
is continually enlarging and becoming more 
abundant. Everything in life that has a pure- 
ly selfish and personal purpose must end 
in satiety. Every purpose conscientiously 
wrought out for the universal good must 
bring a greater joy into the life. Life only 
becomes large and full of meaning when we 
lose the thought of the self. When we are 
living and working with the thought of the 
world's good at heart, the self is best cared 
for. When our bodies are hale and well, we 
take the least thought of them, so, when the 
mind is thoroughly poised in the welfare of 
others, the self is best preserved and cared for. 



222 The Will to be Well 

Nature demands of us that we should keep 
ourselves thoroughly balanced, that we should 
refrain from all excess, because an excess in 
any direction is always followed by a reaction. 
The inevitable effect of excessive pleasure is 
excessive pain, or the effort of nature to bring 
about the equilibrium of life. 

Let us remember that everything in life is 
good, that it is the over use, or excess, that 
brings the distress. We need temperance in 
all things. There are many things in life that 
we enjoy and take pleasure in, but a time 
comes when, through the excess of use, all the 
enjoyment goes out. This applies to the in- 
tellectual plane quite as much as to the phys- 
ical. People sometimes take up certain lines 
of reading, giving so much attention to it that 
they neglect other things which are necessary 
to keep life properly poised, which is sure to 
result in mental indigestion, and also the loss 
of the continued enjoyment which might have 
ensued if the reading had been taken in a more 
temperate way. 

This is often true concerning the religious 
side of life. How often it has been noted that, 
after a revival has subsided, the people who 
have taken the most active part, have, after a 
comparatively short time, lost interest in the 
continued religious effort. 



The Controlled Life 223 

In order, therefore, to avoid satiety, let us 
use moderation in all things. It is a very 
great question whether one does not accom- 
plish more in life through a sustained mod- 
erate effort than can be accomplished in a 
great effort which leaves one depleted after- 
ward. It is true, there are supreme moments 
in life when great efforts should be made, but 
they do not concern the every-day life. They 
are exceptional, and the one who leads a tem- 
perate life will be better able to cope with 
great emergencies than the one who is always 
doing things in an excessive way. 

As we grow older in years, life's shadows 
should not gather thickly about us, but rather 
should it be like the sun's going down beyond 
the horizon, where the after-glow deepens into 
twilight, and the stars come out, casting their 
silvery radiance on the earth below, and the 
night passes into the morning of a still more 
beautiful day, 




HEALTH OF MIND AND BODY 

" Strength results alone from the mind's intention. 
If you remove (from conduct) the purpose of the 
mind, the bodily act is but as rotten wood; wherefore, 
regulate the mind, and then the body will spontane- 
ously go right. 

" But by earnestness and diligence, then, we conquer. 

" Walking in the path of true wisdom, letting go both 
extremes, we then reach ultimate perfection. 

"Your evil thoughts and evil words but hurt your- 
self and not another; nothing so full of victory as 
patience, though your body suffer the pain of mutilation. 

" For, recollect that he who has this patience can not 
be overcome, his strength being so firm ; therefore, give 
not way to anger or evil words toward men in power. 

" Arger and hate destroy the true law, and they de- 
stroy dignity and beauty of body, as when one dies we 
lose our name for beauty, so the fire of anger itself 
burns up the heart." 

— Gotama Buddha. 

It seems to me we can not too often nor too 
thoroughly consider this subject of health in 
its various phases. In reality, in its entirety, 
it comprises all there is of life. Health of 
body and health of mind are so related that 
one is not possible without the other. The 
mind must be well balanced if the physical 
health is to be normal. Abstention from va- 
224 



Health of Mind and Body 225 

rious articles of food, the observance of many 
outward conditions, are all good in their way, 
but the thoroughly poised mind will attend to 
these details in a perfectly natural manner, 
without effort — even unconsciously. It is use- 
less, however, to strain after physical health 
through conformity to outward regulations 
alone. Every effort to regulate the life from 
the outside must fail because that is not the 
way God works ; it is contrary to all the laws 
of man's life. The inner life is continually 
pressing upon the outer for expression. Life 
is a constant adjustment to environment and 
to people. All of us have experienced the 
feelings first of like and then dislike, or vice 
versa, toward some individual. Now, very 
likely the individual was the same in both in- 
stances and it was only our own or his mood 
that changed. It is this mood, this phase of 
mind, which we must learn to control. Once 
under our control, we can love as readily and 
as widely as we hate or feel indifference — more 
readily, indeed, because it is really in accord- 
ance with the deepest, most vital laws of our 
being that we love. 

There are many things necessary to estab- 
lish perfect mental poise. These are also 
necessary to the harmonious physical and 
spiritual life. The activity of to-day is largely 



226 The Will to be Well 

on the mental plane. The condition of a man's 
mind toward his environment and his fellow 
man is chiefly responsible for his life. The 
mental pictures we make of things are the 
most important factors in the ordering of the 
things about us. If we allow ourselves to be 
disturbed by trivialities, or even by the seem- 
ingly greater things of life, our mental dis- 
turbance and unrest colors all our imaginings. 
If we are happy, all our concepts of life are 
joyous. 

One of the most important elements of har- 
mony in this life is patience. We give all too 
little consideration to this quality, and yet it 
often seems to me that none other is quite com- 
plete without it. We allow ourselves to become 
impatient over little things, and then when 
greater trials come we have no endurance or 
strength with which to meet them. But one 
may say, " Why should we be patient? Why 
not change our conditions and those of the 
people about us? " And my answer is, because 
such desire to change is born chiefly of intoler- 
ance and short-sightedness, a shallow and unlov- 
ing judgment, and we would almost certainly 
destroy thereby the very work we, in our hearts, 
are trying to accomplish. When we try to force 
things to please ourselves we lose all that had 
previously been gained. It is in the nature of 



Health of Mind and Body 227 

things that all permanent success must come 
through natural effort. Nothing forced or strained 
or tense is true in method or result. When, in 
our impatience, we would force an issue we 
say and do what is not born of loving and 
mature thought, often that is not, in the deep- 
est sense, even true, and we lose our own poise 
and peace of mind. To be patient does not 
mean to be inactive, or without hope or desire. 
It merely means to see things in their true 
light and just proportion, to be content for to- 
day with the things of to-day, for so, and so 
only, are greater things possible for to-morrow. 
Then there is the element of perseverance. 
When things do not " go our way," when we 
meet with resistance or obstacles in environ- 
ment or from those about us, we must not give 
up in the face of the first difficulty and con- 
sider ourselves defeated. There is no defeat 
for earnest, untiring, sincere effort. Think of 
the farmer in the time of seed-sowing. But 
for former experiences, how long it would seem 
before any reward for his toil is visible ! How 
many days of darkness and unreward he lives 
through before the first tiny blade of hope ap- 
pears to crown his watchfulness ! Because he 
has sowed and reaped in other years he has pa- 
tience — he knows. Because the man of spir- 
itual insight knows, he has patience and he per- 



228 The Will to be Well 

severes. It is only in the spirit of hopefulness 
that any true work can be done. This is as 
applicable on the spiritual as on the material 
plane. We must, go right on persevering and 
never doubt, and in the end even greater 
things than we had hoped will be our reward. 

There is also a certain phase of sensitive- 
ness that makes for harmony — the sensitive- 
ness which makes one careful of another's 
interests. But oversensitiveness leads to nerv- 
ousness, lack of poise, and, consequently, ill 
health. The question often arises as to 
whether sensitiveness is an aid or a hindrance 
to mental and physical development. On any 
plane it should be regarded an indication of 
growth, and yet there is much which passes 
under this head which, if rightly classified, 
would be found to be selfishness. Self-con- 
sciousness is as much a form of selfishness as 
the desire for other people's possessions. 
When people are aggrieved over the unkind 
remark of another, it is not sensitiveness but 
selfishness ; because if the mind were not cen- 
tered on the importance of self, it would not 
permit trivialities to disturb the serenity. 

True sensitiveness is that condition of mind 
which is quick to apprehend the truth, thus 
making it possible to attain a true adjustment 
of life. The one who is truly sensitive will so 



Health of Mind and Body 229 

understand his neighbor that justice and 
equity become his normal impulse. He will 
perceive the reasonable demands that others 
make on his time and service; his sensitive- 
ness, too, will determine when such demands 
are unreasonable, and the poised mind will 
refuse to comply with these latter. Sensitive- 
ness, if heeded, warns us against dangers, and 
numerous unhappy occurrences may thus be 
obviated. It is true that the sensitive-minded 
person, when not adjusted to environment, suf- 
fers far more than does the non-sensitive ; but 
this very capacity for suffering shows that, 
when rightly adjusted, there is the greater 
capacity for joy and happiness. 

Let us learn to use this quality in the high- 
est sense, and it will be revealed to us that our 
greatest good will accrue through its use. 

Then we need courage. Sometimes we mis- 
take the meaning of courage — we think it is 
the speaking out of whatever comes into our 
minds, or carrying a certain point in despite of 
all opposition. Often the truest courage re- 
quires of us that we wholly give up our own 
way, our own preferences, rather than bring 
about inharmony and discord. Sometimes 
simple inactivity is the highest type of cour- 
age. Unthinking violence is not courage. 
True courage requires a calm and unpreju- 



230 The Will to be Well 

diced judgment to direct it, and then whatever 
one's best self dictates one must abide by. 
The way of hasty judgment and impulse is 
the easier way often, but it is seldom the bet- 
ter. A hasty action may require but a moment 
for its performance, but the consequences fol- 
lowing in its wake may fill a lifetime. Keep 
the mind poised — unprejudiced and receptive, 
and then whatever comes to us from the 
silence will give us the true direction. It is 
not when we are working most strenuously to 
accomplish a certain end that we see the most 
clearly, that we can most readily hear God's 
word in the depths of our souls. Once we 
know this inner silence, then will we speak 
only when we have something of value to 
impart, then will our words carry weight, and 
all we say will leave its lasting impress. 

Truthfulness is another element in health. 
This means far more than accuracy of speech 
and adherence to facts. One can never be 
wholly true to another, or in any situation, 
until one is true to one's self in the uttermost 
detail. We can never be more to another than 
we are to ourselves. We may seem to be, but 
falseness can breed only falseness and truth 
only truth. Only in so far as we know for 
ourselves can we give to others. We may, of 
course, give the initial impulse from which 






Health of Mind and Body 231 

another works out something grander than 
our farthest conception. But this is due to 
the other's greater powers, not our own. And, 
on the other hand, whatever we have we 
must impart. This is the law. It is in the 
nature of things that what we do not share, 
and share continually, we lose altogether. To 
each is given some specific gift — not to keep, 
but to give out again, freelv, ungrudgingly, 
unquestioningly, as the sun gives its light. 
With some it is the gift of healing, with 
others that of material assistance or the uplift 
of spiritual insight. To be true to ourselves 
we must give what we have — give as it has 
been given unto us, and let who will, take and 
enjoy. There is always some one needing just 
what we have to give — just at this moment, 
maybe, needing it direly, importunately. Only 
as we share what we have, can we make just 
and true use of it ourselves — can we under- 
stand our gift and understand ourselves. 
This, too, is part of the truthfulness of life. 

It is not always the truth or a desire to be 
truthful that is the motive at the bottom of 
much of our so-called candor and frankness. 
Many a thing, though true to fact, is said or done 
in a spirit of unkindness. The true telling of 
a thing depends wholly on the spirit in which 
it is told, whether our motive is to help or to 



232 The Will to be Well 

hurt, to heal the bruised spirit or to probe an 
old wound. There is nothing in the spirit of 
truth that would wound. Let us, in all hon- 
esty, ask ourselves as to our motives both in 
what we say and what we do. A very good 
thing, you know, may be done with a very mean 
motive, and, on the other hand, a poor and 
tawdry action may yet have the spirit of kind- 
ness as its mainspring. In everything it is 
the impulse, the motive, that counts. We are 
given to too hasty and superficial judgments. 
It is not what we think but what we feel that 
counts. If we are right, at the heart of things, 
the outward will take care of itself. Few 
people express their ideals in the initial effort. 
Over and over again we must try, hopefully, 
without discouragement. And when to-day's 
ideal is realized there will be yet another and 
a greater one to strive for on the morrow. No 
one ever gives a final expression of his ideal. 
It is the ideal that forever haunts us — that 
alone convicts us of sin. Other people can 
not convict nor even condemn us ; failure is no 
criticism, death no denial, if only the mind be 
at peace with its ideal ; this is the only test, 
the only criterion. And we must never lose 
heart as to this ideal, never be discouraged, 
however distant and unattainable it may seem. 
A thousand years may be as a day, and that 



Health of Mind and Body 233 

which seemed impossible to-day may be real- 
ized with the dawning of to-morrow. This 
rests with each of us. Each can bring it close, 
make it near, immediate, if he will. Your 
ideal is part of your life. The very fact that 
you see it so clearly and desire it so unceas- 
ingly is the pledge that it can never fail you. 
There is no power on earth that can defraud 
you of its realization ; you alone can defer it. 
No other can make true your ideal ; it is for 
you alone — for you, unalterably and forever. 
And its very strength and impelling, torturing 
force are the seal and the prophecy of its ful- 
filment. These are some of the things that 
make for health, and chiefest among them, in- 
cluding all else indeed, is this fidelity to one's 
ideal. 

Among the things that do not make for 
healthfulness is a false concept of life, a mag- 
nifying of the little trials and difficulties of the 
passing days, or a shirking of their adjust- 
ment. Now, nothing comes to us that is too 
difficult, nothing that is not needful for our 
progress ; we are never overthrown by any out- 
ward circumstances, we never fail unless we 
consciously cease to try. As our days, so shall 
our strength be. If the things other people 
dp or say in regard to us distress and wound 
us. it is because there is some remnant of these 



234 The Will to be Well 

impulses still within ourselves. There is yet 
some point of contact, of lodgment, else we 
could not feel them in any personal way. 
When we let our minds dwell on these little 
trials and annoyances, they sap our vitality 
and destroy our usefulness. The only failure 
in life is the failure to do the best we know, to 
strive and strive unceasingly after our ideal. 
Even when others, with design and malice, try 
to injure us, they are powerless if we choose 
that they shall be, if in ourselves there is no 
reflection of the motives that actuate them. 
It is within ourselves that we conquer out- 
ward conditions. There is no way of over- 
coming evil but with good. 

Faultfinding, either with ourselves or with 
others, is another phase of mental activity that 
does not conduce to health. If it seems to us 
that others are in fault, let us first look within 
and see if we may not be also responsible. 
But, better yet, let us get a new view-point, a 
new adjustment, and look for the good and not 
the evil, and the fault will disappear of itself. 
When our mental vision is focused, so to 
speak, on the evil in life, this shadow side of 
things possesses us, obsesses us, indeed, and 
the subconscious mind becomes so filled with 
pictured evil that even a helpful suggestion 
from another mind brings out an evil and un- 



Health of Mind and Body 235 

wholesome response, whereas, if, on the other 
hand, we keep constantly impressing the con- 
scious mind with pictures of what is beautiful 
and healthgiving and uplifting, the subcon- 
scious will prove a veritable storehouse of 
benefaction and blessing, welling up into the 
life of activity in strength and beauty and har- 
mony. Then it will be easier to do right than 
wrong, easier to see good than evil, easier and 
a thing of course, and only natural to realize 
outwardly, throughout the life, the inward 
health and beauty. We make life as we live — 
life to-day for each of us is just what we 
planned it, consciously or otherwise, yester- 
day. And to-morrow it will be after the pat- 
tern that we are fashioning in our thoughts 
to-day. Other people are not responsible for 
our lives. We alone have brought about every 
circumstance and condition. If we are not 
satisfied in our own souls, then the acclama- 
tion of the world would be of small avail. The 
world of Jesus' time found nothing too bad to 
say about Him, and yet in the peace of His 
heart there was no room for despair — that 
peace which the world can neither give nor 
take away. Now let each one of us who real- 
izes the truth of this begin to-day — go sys- 
tematically to work to fill the mind with con- 
cepts of health and beauty — make over our 



236 



The Will to be Well 



lives from this moment, thought by thought, 
impulse by impulse, act by act. Then every- 
thing that comes to us, will, in the alchemy of 
this resolve, turn to good for us and all with 
whom we come into contact. Let none be dis- 
couraged. Remember the past is past, but 
out of the right living of the present, to-day, 
this moment, we are building the temple of 
the future. 







THE CONTINUITY OF LIFE 

" All leads up higher, 

All shapes out dimly the superior race, 
The heir of hopes too fair to turn out false. 

So far the seal 

Is put on life 

And a new glory mixes with the heaven 
And earth . . . 

to fill us with regard for man, 
Desire to work his proper nature out, 
And ascertain his rank and final place; 
For these things tend still upward, progress is 
The law of life, man is not Man as yet. 
Nor shall I deem his object served, his end 
Attained, his genuine strength put fairly forth, 
While only here and there a star dispels 
The darkness, here and there a towering mind 
O'erlooks its prostrate fellows: when the host 
Is out at once to the despair of night, 
When all mankind alike is perfected, 
Equal in full-blown powers — then, not till then, 
I say, begins man's general infancy." 

— Browning. 

Just at this time the press on both sides of 
the world is discussing the question of long 
life. More than one scientist of note has pub- 
licly averred that at least a century should be 
accorded man as his natural length of life on 

237 



238 The Will to be Well 

this earth in full possession of all his faculties, 
arguing in some cases by analogy from the 
maturity of animals and their length of life 
after that period as compared with that of 
man. Now, this is just what mental scientists 
have declared for the last twenty years. It is 
interesting to note how, point by point, investi- 
gators along material lines are conceding in 
the main nearly all that New Thought stands 
for. This matter of health and longevity is an 
important case in question. We are told by 
the more advanced physicians and more liberal 
scientists that if we would change our habits 
somewhat — abstaining from some things and 
observing others with regularity — there is no 
reason why the majority of us may not reach 
this high-water mark of long life. One of the 
most important things from which to refrain, 
they tell us, is worry. Now this again is in 
exact agreement with the teachings of Mental 
Science as well as the Bible. Jesus did not go 
into physiological details and explain the chem- 
ical changes resulting from worry of mind 
when He said : " Take no anxious thought for 
the morrow, neither be ye of doubtful mind." 
Elsewhere, however, he added that if any one 
should do His will he would know the doc- 
trine, if he followed his word he would later 
discern the reason for its being given. Men- 



The Continuity of Life 239 

tal and other scientists are now only giving 
us the reasons — classifying the causes and re- 
sults. Eminent scientists have told us of the 
effect of fear and anger on the blood and the 
tissues of the body. Worry and anxiety have 
a similar effect. And not only do these and 
kindred emotions produce such changes in the 
fluids and tissue of our own bodies, but often 
when we eat meat we assimilate material al- 
ready disordered by such passions which of 
necessity tend to reproduce themselves in us, 
poisoning the blood by disturbing — recombin- 
ing, so to speak — the elements of our bodies, 
and so disordering the whole physical organ- 
ism. Of course, one may say, this is only 
disorder, but it is none the less poison, and 
none the less leaves its injurious marks upon 
the life. Centuries before the old Levitical 
law was given, the eating of meat was held as 
deleterious to development by those who 
would excel in spirituality. The advice of the 
scientists of to-day and the apostles of lon- 
gevity is in exact accordance with these tradi- 
tions of the ages. The meat-eating nations 
of the world are the most warlike, and they 
also are, as a whole, under the greatest domi- 
nance of the fear of death. Tests have been 
made in Germany in hundred-mile races be- 
tween the endurance of vegetarians and meat 



240 The Will to be Well 

eaters. In one instance none of the latter 
were able to finish the race, and in every case 
those who had confined themselves to a fruit, 
vegetable, and nut diet showed themselves ca- 
pable of the greatest endurance and ran the full 
hundred miles. Even the greatest of the 
Christian churches found it expedient to ad- 
vise a certain period of abstinence from meats. 
Heretofore many people have thought that the 
incorporation of a certain amount of animal 
tissue with their sustenance was necessary to 
keep the body in proper order — that the nerv- 
ous system especially required it. A number 
of highly developed people instinctively turned 
against it, but ate it, nevertheless, as a duty, and 
not because they craved it. The cold-blooded 
animals, not having as highly developed men- 
tal and nervous systems, have not the same 
capacity for suffering, and hence in eating the 
flesh of these one does not incur, to the same 
degree, injurious effects, as, in giving up their 
lives, they do so with less disturbance of the 
organism. But the purest flesh and most en- 
during physique is built of sun-ripened fruits 
and grain. 

Another point insisted upon by the scientists 
of the hygienic world of to-day is the necessity 
for plenty of fresh air. Now you know there 
may be any quantity of clean, wholesome air 



The Continuity of Life 241 

all about us, and yet we be unable to appro- 
priate the amount necessary for health because 
so few of us know how to use our lungs as 
they should be used, and so get little benefit, 
even when we are bathed and enveloped in the 
purest of air. A ship was once becalmed 
where the Amazon empties into the gulf, its 
great volume of fresh water pushing out the 
salt for miles and miles, when another vessel 
came in sight and was hailed for water. " Let 
down your buckets where you are," the other 
signaled back, and they did, and found an 
abundance to quench their thirst. It is just 
so with ourselves and the air that surrounds 
us on every side. If we lived natural lives we 
would have no need of giving special attention 
to our breathing. As it is, however, the ma- 
jority of us must make a constant effort to in- 
hale and exhale in the right way. We have 
five or six times the lung capacity that we use, 
and yet some of us go through an entire life- 
time without knowing what it is to have one 
full, rythmic breath. Nevertheless, this appar- 
ently simple matter of breathing is the key- 
note, one might say, of almost every other 
phase of life. 

Then there is the question of sleep. Scien- 
tists of to-day are giving an increasing amount 
of attention to this. We all know how uncer- 



242 The Will to be Well 

tain a matter it is, and how seemingly at times 
beyond our control. One night we will derive 
great benefit from our sleep, and another, un- 
der apparently the same conditions, we will 
feel none at all. Now one great reason for 
this is the state in which the mind is when 
sleep overtakes us. If we are filled with 
thoughts of care and trouble as soon as we 
enter the sleeping state the mind becomes asso- 
ciated with the whole world of care and trou- 
ble, and is helpless, one might say, in its grasp. 
One or two hours of good, natural sleep are 
worth as many whole nights of disturbed men- 
tal consciousness. The mind is almost as 
active, but less positive, in sleep as during wak- 
ing hours. We should be careful to fill it with 
good suggestions — uplifting thoughts — before 
losing physical consciousness, and then it will 
continue along these lines throughout the en- 
tire night. Much of the past asserts itself in 
sleep through the subconscious mind. If Ave 
systematically make an effort to direct the 
activities of the mentality during sleep we will 
find not only that we can control our dreams, 
but that a little sleep will give us the refresh- 
ment and benefit which formerly we did not 
derive even from a long period of semi-uncon- 
sciousness. We can have that so-called dream- 
less sleep that is most restful of all. Now, as 



The Continuity of Life 243 

a matter of fact, I do not know that it is really 
a dreamless sleep. I think, rather, that it is 
the freedom to go over to another plane of life 
so different from this that there is no interpre- 
tation possible from one to the other. It is a 
complete change, and in this lies its chief bene- 
fit. If we do not worry (for worry vitiates 
every fiber and activity of the body, so that 
even the most wholesome food taken into the 
system is perverted and causes distress) — if 
we do not assimilate poisonous materials, such 
as the disordered carcasses of animals who 
gave up their lives under terror and pain — if 
we breathe and sleep property, there is no rea- 
son why we may not, at the age of a hundred 
years, be enjoying the full use of every faculty 
with the added riches of experience to guide 
us, and the prospect of still more years of 
interest and activity. So much for the outer 
conditions that conduce to longevity. I have 
touched on these first because they are the 
more apparent, and because material scientists 
are giving them more prominence at the mo- 
ment. But it is altogether probable that it 
will not be long before their laboratorial experi- 
ments will uphold the beliefs of the mental 
scientists, that it is the mental condition even 
more than any outward place or pressure that 
determines the activities of the life. They 



244 The Will to be Well 

now concede that worry is deleterious. Why 
do they not go a step further, and admit that 
the mental attitude decides the activity of the 
digestive organs. For this is true, and it is our 
state of mind that determines whether the 
same food shall go to the upbuilding or the 
down-pulling of the body. It is wholly true 
that it is " not that which goeth into a man that 
defileth him, but that which proceedeth out of 
his heart." There is still another sense in 
which we should eat " in remembrance of Me." 
— take all sustenance in the thought of the 
highest, of the Christ within, in remembrance 
of the " temple of the living God," for the up- 
building of which it is. But, one may say, this 
is impossible; there is so much to claim one's 
attention, one's thought — even anxious 
thought in this workaday world. Now this is 
the fact, worry never accomplished anything, 
worry only pulls down, never achieves. There 
is nothing that " requires " worry. There may 
be much that demands close and intelligent 
attention, our best mental activity, but worry 
thought, fearful thought, anxious thought, 
never accomplished anything but harm. We 
are told to bear one another's burdens — some 
may interpret this to mean that we should 
hold anxious thoughts for each other. But 
this is not so. We can help others only as we 



The Continuity of Life 245 

keep strong and true ourselves. We are also 
told to work out our own salvation. This is 
not contradictory. We can help each other 
most by working out, in so far as we can, our 
own problems. None of us can do this wholly 
independent of any one else; we need each 
other, and separateness means weakness, al- 
ways; but in so far as we are able we should 
walk each in his own way, yet living in the 
larger consciousness of life, in the knowledge 
that all are related, and only as we live as 
members one of another can we ourselves 
grow mentally and physically. All life is from 
the one source ; only as we live in the full con- 
sciousness of this can we live the full, natural 
life — only as we realize to the uttermost that 
there is no separation between ourselves and 
God, ourselves and our fellow men. 

Thoughts of peace and good will are also 
like an armor. Surrounded by these, any an- 
tagonism or unkindness from others or the 
thrusts and bruises of adverse circumstances 
do not hurt us. They are like a barrier to 
keep out all that is harmful. Whereas, on the 
other hand, if our minds are filled with unkind 
thoughts and we feel hardly toward others, 
we have, as it were, thrown the door open to 
all sorts of harmful influences and put our- 
selves down on their plane. Otherwise peo- 



246 The Will to be Well 

pie may think and act as they please, nothing 
unrestful or discordant could enter our atmos- 
phere, " no harm can come near thy dwelling- 
place." 

Some people say that the world is growing 
worse, and point to isolated instances of evil 
in illustration. But this is not fair. We must 
view life as a whole, and as a whole the level 
of good is far higher than ever before; the 
standards of the masses are higher, and in- 
creasing numbers of people are reaching out 
for nobler and better things. Consequently, 
within the last generation the average lifetime 
has been prolonged from five to seven years. 
Life must lengthen as it grows better. The 
names of our diseases have increased in num- 
ber, but the average of health has improved 
nevertheless. When we all come to the con- 
viction that the causes of disease are mental, 
then in eliminating one cause we will at the 
same time have thus wiped out of existence 
perhaps half a dozen so-called diseases. Most 
of those who leave this world now do so by 
the way of ill health. While we still believe 
ourselves under the dominance of disease, we 
have no opportunity of discovering what 
length or perfection of life we may attain. 
Our going is not the natural one, as is the fall- 
ing of a ripe and perfect fruit, but it is involun- 



The Continuity of Life 247 

tary and painful, and, therefore, unnatural. The 
germ of disease is not physical ; it is in mind, 
and not matter. If the whole world were full 
of " germs " a man may so place himself in 
relation to these or any other force in the uni- 
verse that nothing can harm him. The 91st 
Psalm has been called " a poem of the New 
Thought " : " Thou wilt keep him in perfect 
peace whose mind is stayed on Thee." It is 
the dream of some (I say dream because it is 
still undemonstrated) to remain eternally on 
this planet. Now it does not seem to me that 
this would be wholly desirable. It is desirable 
that we live out our natural length of days, and 
go only when we have learned our lessons 
and finished our work. There are certain 
phases of knowledge to be gained here, and if 
in our weakness and fear of disease and imag- 
inary evils we allow ourselves to give up, and 
succumb before we have been through our al- 
lotted experiences, then we have not lived out 
our days. Knowledge must be gained by the in- 
dividual through individual experiences. An- 
other may help, but no other can live our life for 
us. We ourselves must go through every ex- 
perience necessary for development. Some one 
else may help us, but no one else's experience 
may be substituted for our own. For instance, 
one may talk to us about insomnia or indiges- 



248 The Will to be Well 

tion, and may give us a very good mental con- 
cept of such disorders, but we can have no 
real knowledge of them until we have had a 
moment's personal experience of them. There 
is a development that is more like an unfold- 
ing — gradual, natural, beautiful. But if we 
will not surrender our wills to the Universal 
Will, if we will not open our hearts at the 
touch of the Universal Love, then experiences 
come to us that open our eyes and open our 
hearts, and turn us — forcibly, if there is no 
other way — in the way that we should go — the 
way that is a way of pleasantness and the path 
that is peace. For we must all be purified and 
made strong — either by meeting and overcom- 
ing temptation, or by meeting it and falling be- 
fore it. Failure sometimes teaches us more 
than victory. Nothing is meaningless. What 
we need comes to us, if not in one way then 
in another, and all works together for good — 
for the development of the latent possibilities 
within us. Everything counts, everything is 
adding to the store of wisdom and usefulness 
— both good and the so-called evil. There is 
no such thing as standing still, or, for that mat- 
ter, of going back — except as the arrow is 
drawn back, perhaps, that it may go more 
surely and swiftly. When you saw off a tree 
you notice the innumerable circles within cir- 



The Continuity of Life 249 

cles that make up the huge trunk from heart to 
bark, some of them little wider than a pin- 
head. Each of these circles required a year in 
the making, and it is not difficult to trace the 
years of drouth and those of full rains by the 
width of these rings. But no matter how un- 
favorable the conditions, something was added 
each twelvemonth. And so it is with our lives. 
We keep on developing, unfolding, through 
whatever circumstances may come, to the end 
that the innermost may be expressed in the 
outermost, living our lives in this world to the 
fullest and deepest, for this is the truest and 
best preparation for all life to come. 

A New Testament writer tells us that we 
" shall not all sleep, but that we shall all be 
changed." He refers to this something which 
we call death as sleep. Jesus also spoke of it 
in this way. He said : " Our friend Lazarus 
sleepeth. I go that I may awake him out of 
sleep." The disciples said: "If he sleep, he 
shall do well." Then Jesus said, plainly : "Laza- 
rus is dead." He had to make use of the gen- 
erally accepted term to make them understand. 
Over and over again Jesus referred to the 
Father as " not the God of the dead, but of the 
living." And yet despite the spirituality of 
his teaching, Christians seem to hold, more 
tenaciously, perhaps, than any other religious 



; 5<> 



The Will to be Well 



body, to the idea of a ressurrection of matter. 
Just now, throughout the world, groups of 
people are organized to investigate psychic 
phenomena as bearing on the subject of the 
continuity of life. Many people have proved 
this to their own satisfaction, but it is not yet 
on a basis that is provable to others, a»d the 
great outer world is still densely materialistic. 
Even many of the larger religious bodies lay 
great stress on the material side of life — the 
amassing of riches and earthly possessions. 
Now the coming of these into the life is only 
right and as it should be when they come in 
accordance with the law that when we " seek 
first the Kingdom of God all these things shall 
be added." But when they are striven for as 
an end in themselves it is a different matter, 
and not helpful to the development of true 
spiritually. We know, all of us, that we can 
take none of these things with us, that through 
the door of death no material thing may pass, 
and so of what profit is it that we spend a 
whole lifetime for that which we must leave 
when we leave this earthly plane? Only a 
few years ago I heard a clergyman say, in con- 
signing the body of a friend to the grave : "The 
soul has gone to its Maker, the body we lay in 
the ground ; but it will rise again, and the two 
will be united." Now, in my opinion, it is just 



The Continuity of Life 251 

this belief that is keeping us from a true spir- 
itual conception of the continuance of life. It 
is the spirit which quickeneth ; the flesh is of 
no vital import. Jesus said : " I have power to 
lay down, and I have power to take up again." 
This is the Christian atitude, or should be, 
that the body is a garment, to be used and laid 
aside at will. The body we now have is not 
the only garment of the soul, and immortality 
is in nowise dependent upon the gathering 
together again from the elements of every 
particle of matter that this earth garment com- 
prises. For that matter, we now know that 
every few months every atom in our make-up 
changes, and new fiber and new material takes 
its place. Now, how could all of this — all 
these various, successive bodies, one might 
say — be ressurrected and reunited? Some peo- 
ple say that as long as the world lasts there 
must be birth and death. But it is not the 
mere fact of death that the more serious minds 
would desire to blot out. Death, under true 
circumstances, is as natural and grateful and 
welcome as any other event in a normal life. 
It is the unnatural and premature coming of 
death (it should be like sleep, a simple, rest- 
ful rounding out of a normal, completed activ- 
ity) that I would protest against. It is the 
" sting of death " that makes it an " enemy." 



252 The Will to be Well 

It is because we have associated the thought 
of sin with death that it has such terrors for 
us. And it is only too true that broken laws 
are the cause of many deaths. If we lived in 
accordance with the laws of life, the Law of 
Love, it could not be said of us that we do not 
live out half our days. As long as we believe 
ourselves under the law of sin and death — a 
law that we have invented for ourselves — so 
long will it have dominion over us. And not 
until we come into the realization of the law 
of the " Spirit of Life " are we freed from its 
force. In the early times death came more 
nearly as it comes to animals — wild animals, 
now — as a simple going to sleep. Domestic 
animals are more in touch with human 
thought, and often suffer sympathetically in 
consequence. With the increase of thought 
and feeling and nervous development in man 
has come added capacity for pain, both in its 
endurance and its anticipation. As a matter 
of fact, the most of our suffering is in its an- 
ticipation. The actual moment of pain often 
brings its own anesthetic. All natural passing 
away and change, whether of the body or of 
other forms is painless — a ripening and a 
sleep. It is only the unnaturalness of man's 
life that makes him dread the coming of the 
time of his own passing out. And it required 



The Continuity of Life 253 

generations and centuries of generations for 
him to develop the idea of a life beyond that of 
the body. The innate and indestructible feel- 
ing that the center of his real self is without 
sin and true, even though he did not formulate 
this to himself, made it necessary for man to 
invent something outside of himeslf as a dele- 
terious force bringing sickness and death into 
the world, and so the devil came into existence. 
Then came the idea that something must be 
sacrificed to propitiate an angry diety, and per- 
fect things were offered up by priests " without 
blemish." Throughout the life this idea of 
sacrifice continues under one form or another 
until at last the man comes to see that no ex- 
ternal thing, whether sacrificed or not, can 
avail him anything. Then he begins to sac- 
rifice himself — his loves and impulses, a lesser 
thing for a higher good, until at last the soul 
comes to its own, and realizes that " in the 
eyes of the Lord there is no iniquity," and 
then death is no longer a curse or even a judg- 
ment, but a call to higher things. And this 
change, this altered attitude toward the things 
of this world, may take place right here in this 
life. Jesus taught the idea of judgment in His 
own generation for those who were ready for 
it. The last sacrifice we make is that of the 
law of sin and death to which we have held 



HK 



254 The Will to be Well 

and through which we have failed. St. Paul 
said, "Love is the fulfilling of the law"; St. 
John said, " God is love " ; and Jesus had said, 
in that wonderful prayer of His, that " to know 
Thee is life eternal." When you are at one, in 
every avenue and detail of your life, with this 
Law of Love — the will of God — then you be- 
come a law unto yourself, and all material 
things are subject unto you — even the last 
enemy, death. The body may pass when its 
work is done, but the spirit that animated it 
is one with the eternal. Jesus said, " If I be 
lifted up, I will draw all men unto Me " ; in 
other words, " If I attain to this eternal knowl- 
edge, so will all others. As it came to me, it 
will come to them." Paul said : " If the dead 
rise not, then is Christ not risen." The law 
that governed His life and unfolding governs 
yours and mine. There are different condi- 
tions leading up to this supreme condition : 
" there is an earthly and a heavenly " ; we must 
not confound the two — those of the first order 
are passing at best. If we are basing any 
hopes on the physical, then are we getting 
away from the thought of the Master. The 
informing spirit will choose its own form when 
this body shall have passed. We shall take 
with us all the true riches: all that we have 
truly worked and lived for, every good feeling, 



•o 



The Continuity of Life 255 

every good thought, every impulse of love — 
the love we have given others — this is the love 
that abides with us. These are the real riches 
of which no one can «Fob us, that day by day 
we are storing up in life. Knowledge that 
pertains only to this world we can not take — 
of what use would be a knowledge of botany 
or theology on the other side ? St. Paul says : 
" And whether there be knowledge it shall van- 
ish away/' and " When that which is perfect is 
come into the life, then that which is part shall 
be done away." This world's knowledge 
serves to bring out latent possibilities, and so 
is useful ; but it is not a thing to be striven for 
as an end in itself — to the gaining of which are 
to be sacrificed the " abiding riches." And so, 
though we " shall not all sleep we shall all be 
changed," we " shall have power to lay down 
and power to take again," we shall live out the 
" length of our days," and go willingly, gladly, 
into the brighter day that is beyond. 




* 



BY THE SAME AUTHOR 

The Measure of a Man 

CONTENTS 
Tart One Tart Ttvo 

IN HIS IMAGE THE SON OF MAN 

Introduction Introduction 
I. The Natural Man I. The Son of Man as Man 

II. The Rational Man II. The Son of Man as Idealist 

III. The Psychic Man III. The Son of Man as Teacher 

IV. The Spiritual Man IV. The Son of Man as Healer 

"A MESSAGE OF HOPE AND OPTIMISM" 

Throughout he is buoyantly optimistic, and helpful to cour- 
ageous and wholesome living. — Outlook, New York. 

It is pervaded by a ruggedness of conviction that strengthens 
and uplifts the reader. — Democrat and Chronicle, Rochester, N.Y. 

The book is one of the most serious and helpful tendency, and 
is to be commended for its breadth. — Globe-Democrat, St. Louis.. 

It is written with literary skill, and every line bears evidence 
to the author's sincerity in what he expounds. 

— Times, Minneapolis, Minn. 

A book of hope to such as need a brighter light to a better 
life. — Courier Journal, Louisville, Ky. 

The book is buoyant and optimistic, and teaches the perfection 
of life that follows obedience to natural and spiritual laws. 

— Mobile Register. 

It is the purpose of the author to show the different stages 
and degrees of growth in human life; that the very mistakes and 
sins of men tend to bring about the fuller and complete life; 
that in the grand economy of the universe nothing is lost, but 
that all things work together for good. 

— Epworth Herald, Chicago, 111. 

The author takes a sane, rational, optimistic view of life. Life 
is not degraded, but grand and noble. It is a book well worth 
reading, and will stimulate thought. 

— Midland Methodist, Westerville and Columbus. 

In this volume the author presents a positive, clear, and forci- 
ble appeal for the adoption of the Christian life. The plea for 
a sane, righteous, spiritual life is convincing and stimulating. 
— Christian Work and Evangelist, New York. 

8vo, cloth. Price, $1.20, net 

FUNK & WAGNAIXS COMPANY 

NEW YORK AND LONDON 



A FEW OF THE MANY REVIEWS OF 

Dominion & Power 

BY CHARLES BRODIE PATTERSON 



The book, which it is interesting to note, is now in its fifth 
edition, is practically the exposition of a philosophy of life 
based upon a deeply religious estimate of life's controlling forces. 
. . . The development of the argument occupies twenty odd 
chapters, short, but representing a great deal of thinking, and 
evidently the work of a highly intellectual man and a sincere 
Christian in the best sense of the word. 

— The Weekly Press, Christchurch, New Zealand. 

The book is clear, true, and convincing, written on the highest 
plane, wins confidence, and makes the study of spiritual science 
both a delightful and a remunerative thing. — Boston Ideas. 

A good book is one of the best gifts you can think of making 
to those you love. And when that book is full of thought then 
it becomes a priceless treasure. . . . The book we have in mind 
is of this type, one that relates in simplest word and phrase 
what " Dominion and Power " means when applied to the every- 
day ordering of life. — The Bayonne Standard. 

Lovers of Mr. Patterson's books will find this work one of the 
best products of his genius. It deals with a wide variety of 
subjects, all of which have a direct bearing on individual life 
and character, and upon man's social, spiritual, and intellectual 
relations. — The Light of Reason, London, England. 

It is . . . delightful to find a book that one can recommend 
as a whole, that presents consecutive features, worthy the atten- 
tion of the student, of practical aid to the earnest seeker. Such 
a book is the one before us, a collection of essays, styled by the 
author " Studies in Spiritual Science." The spiritual element 
is emphasized throughout in a simple and dignified manner, void 
of that emotionalism that so frequently characterizes attempts at 
spirituality. . . . We heartily recommend its perusal to our 
readers. — The Exodus. 

Among the most notable recent works that appeal at once to 
the heart and brain of the thoughtful is Mr. Charles Brodie Pat- 
terson's new book, " Dominion and Power." This really vital 
contribution to the unfoldment of the spiritual life will take a 
high place in the richly suggestive and rapidly growing literature 
of the New Thought Movement. It is an earnest, luminous, and 
thoughtful message, -presented in .a -clear, -concise, and manly 



manner, embodying the ripest experience and conclusions of the 
heart and brain of a broad thinker, and an earnest, truth-loving 
man. — B. O. Flower, in Arena. 

This ... is an earnest and thoughtful book. . . . The 
purpose of the author is to show that the evolution of the indi- 
vidual soul, or, in other words, of the " Kingdom of God " in 
man, and of its attributes of faith, hope, and love, will lead to 
Dominion and Power — to dominion and power over self, and 
therefore over the universe of which the self is a part. 

— The Literary World, London, England. 

In these days, when the mind of man is reaching out for a 
more comprehensive knowledge of the laws which regulate and 
control life, any such book as this by Charles Brodie Patterson 
is eagerly read. — The Boston Budget. 

" Dominion and Power," by Charles Brodie Patterson, the 
distinguished editor of the Arena and Mind, consists of a num- 
ber of thoughtful studies in spiritual science. Its philosophy 
of life is hopeful, helpful, and stimulating. 

— Progress, Minneapolis. 

Like all of Mr. Patterson's writings, this book will bear 
reading. — Light of Truth. 

It is a book which appeals to the heart as well as the brain of 
the thoughtful reader . . . and will find a warm welcome 
wherever it goes. — Psychic Review. 

Never has it been our lot to read a more uplifting book. 

— Health, New York. 

It is worthy your attention.— Life, Kansas City. 

Each chapter in this book is a revealer of truth. 

— W. E. Towne, in Points. 

" Dominion and Power " is a notable addition to the New 
Thought literature of the day. 

— The Cumulative Book Index, Minneapolis, Minn. 

The book is one of inspiration to a life of self-helpfulness and 
help of others. — Toledo Daily Blade. 

If one wishes to get a clear and comprehensive idea of the 
New Thought Movement, let him give Mr. Patterson's book a 
careful reading. It is an honest presentation of a subject at 
once uplifting and of deep interest to the thoughtful. ... It 
attracts the reader by the intensely practical application of its 
spiritual message. — The Bookworm. 

8vo, cloth. Price, $1.20, net 

FUNK & WAGNALLS COMPANY 

NEW YORK AND LONDON 



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